Museum Newsletter - 2 May 2005

Friends of the Bullitt County History Museum
E-Newsletter
May 2, 2005

News: Mt. Washington Spring Festival booth

The Bullitt County History Museum will have a booth at the Mt. Washington Spring festival May 13/14. The booth will be primarily outreach-informative, but will also offer some of our publications and Genealogy Society cloth bags for sale. Come by and visit!

Activity:

>> Our last newsletter mentioned Bullitt County Chief Deputy Mac McAuliffe's loan of an iron kettle and that we were guessing what volume size it was. Well, we measured it by pouring gallon-containers of water in it, measuring 11 gallons. It took four of us to do such a complicated activity [grin]. Jim Cash and I, along with building caretakers Jerry & Renee, got the job done.

>> Thanks to our last year's very generous donor, we have been able to purchase several significant items to help us properly care for our artifacts and papers. We now have a large new flat-file cabinet capable of storing papers as large as a newspaper completely flat for long-term proper care. We have a small photo repeater that allows us to flash pictures on TVs in the display room (we'll probably also use this at festival booths). We have a powerful video projector that will also be used at the festival and at other presentations. As recommended by Kentucky History Society advisor Chuck Backus, we have installed Ultra Violet light protection film on all museum windows. And we have ordered a round reading table for the research room.

>> Economic development Coordinator Bob Fouts and I went to some mapping training in Frankfort and as part of that effort, Frankfort has promised to provide a wonderful wall-sized full-color aerial photo of Bullitt County for our museum, costing us, at most, the price of the paper. It may take a couple of months to get it but it will be worth the wait. Meanwhile, some really cool presentation ideas are being discussed to add to the wall photo.

>> Made possible in large part by the great collection owned by Ken and Barbara Bailey, the museum has been changing a major part of one display area to show the evolution of radio and TV in Bullitt County. Called, "Electricity, Radio, and TV", the display includes many vintage radios and TVs, including what may well be the first TV in Bullitt County, a 1948 Admiral that was displayed in Steve Masden's father's store in Lebanon Junction. Besides Steve's addition to the display, I added a refitted 1950's TV that is being used to present a slideshow of county photos. Salt River Electric is also contributing some items. NEEDED: I would love to have local vintage photos of people gathered around a radio or TV set in the early days.

New Donations/Loans:

>> New volunteer Doug Key came by the museum the other day and wondered whatever happened to some great framed history photos of Bullitt County that Dr. Jagdish Kothari had once displayed in his office. After several calls, we traced the photos to the CARITAS Physician Group on Dixie Highway in Louisville. Turns out they were just thinking about what to do with them. We picked up the ten nicely-framed and matted, large, quality, photos that day and will be hanging them in the museum within the next week or so.

>> We also have several other donations of items that I will detail in the next newsletter.

Another Great Resource:

From the Louisville Genealogical Society comes this recommendation on a web site. www.rssgenealogy.com is a vast listing of internet resources related to genealogy. I can't vouch for any of it but there sure is a LOT of stuff there that looks useful.

Finally:

It's been a very busy time at the museum in many respects, and that trend promises to continue as we become better known and as we try to reach out more to our communities. It's exhausting, but exhilarating at the same time. Just in the past couple of weeks, we have had research visitors from Arkansas, Illinois, Arizona, Kansas, and Tennessee; and I think every one of them found information that they had not found elsewhere. Every day we are improving what we do and becoming known by a wider audience. Be proud, Friends. Spread the word. Our Museum is doing good work!

As always, thank you all for being a Friend of Bullitt County History!

David Strange
Bullitt County History Museum
Executive Director
Museum Phone: 502-921-0161
E-Mail address: David.Strange@BullittCountyHistory.org