Conservation continues, as museum reaches out to new visitors
September 9, 2019 | In the PressFrom WDBJ (https://www.wdbj7.com/content/news/The-Mariners-Museum-refocuses-mission-continues-important-work-
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Visit the galleries of the Mariners Museum, and you'll find life-size replicas of the turret that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and U.S. Navy divers recovered in 2002.
"That's the engine. That's the condenser. That's the structure underneath," said Chief Conservator Will Hoffman, pointing to a drawing of the ship. "We have this whole section of the ship , from here to here," he said.The real thing isn't far away, submerged in a tank, in the lab where a team is conserving more than 200 tons of artifacts from the wreck of the USS Monitor.
The USS Monitor survived the Battle of Hampton Roads, her stand-off with the Confederate ironclad Virginia in March 1862, but she sank later that year in a storm off the coast of North Carolina.
When WDBJ7 visited the museum in 2011, the tank had been drained. We were able to step inside and see the battle scars up close.
Today the work continues. And Hoffman said it is not just life inside the turret that's coming into focus
"You know the coal being burned in the boilers, the guys trying to shovel the coal and the engineers running the engine, basically keeping the heart of the engine alive," Hoffman said. "The crew in the engine room they didn't know what was going on as the battle was being fought, they just have to keep the steam pressure going."
A period of discovery has also been a time of major change for the museum.
Howard Hoege is The Mariners' Museum President and CEO.
"Like a lot of institutions around the country and here in Virginia we were experiencing declining visitation and aging visitation," he told us.
Hoege said the museum sharpened its focus on the audience, and slashed the price of admission to just one dollar per person. Attendance exploded.
And he says the museum is now telling a story that resonates on many different levels.
"Seven African Americans served on the crew of the Monitor, immigrants, people from all different socioeconomic status came together as one team, united by a common purpose and that was the survival of and life of this nation," Hoege said. "And it ends up being a great metaphor and model, symbol for us today."
