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Artifact Spotlight: Exhibit Close-Ups

7/29/2018

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Rounding out our last week of features on our newest Redwood National and State Parks Exhibit, we're featuring a few close encounters of the artifact kind. 

​Thanks to Museum Assistant extraordinaire Sasha Honigman, we have some incredible photos of our current displays. If you haven't seen the displays yet, hopefully these will inspire you to come by and see them for yourself. If you've seen the displays already, these photos are a more intimate view on some of our artifacts on display with their individually unique histories and stories. Enjoy!
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We've also decided to include a few photos from the construction of the exhibit and related community-based art project, also taken by Sasha:
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Artifact Spotlight: WWII and Redwood National and State Parks

7/22/2018

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This is the second to last week of our Artifact Spotlight's special focus on stories related to Redwood National and State Parks in celebration of our new exhibit: The Redwoods Provide(d) .

One thing about National and State Parks that many people forget is that the areas preserved oftentimes contain important and interesting historical, cultural sites. In Redwood National and State Parks, there are two particularly interesting sites associated with World War II that are also represented in the Clarke collections: an enemy aircraft lookout post and the largest WWII memorial in the United States.
​World War II left its mark in Humboldt County in a few different ways. A number of community members served in the war, and many are memorialized in our special exhibition at the Airport. Items from many locals who served can be found in the Clarke collections, from photos to uniforms. Local buildings were even affected, with Founders Hall at HSU being painted in camouflage to the bunkers in Samoa and other structures. Some of those structures are within the present-day Redwood National and State Parks, most notably the Klamath River Radar Site B-71. Rather than being painted green, brown and black, the site used a different type of camouflage to conceal its real purpose.
​It was a small, early radar station, which is why the site is now protected as a historically important site. The buildings were built in response to three Japanese shelling attacks on the Pacific Coast as a system to detect possible attacks along the coastline from Mexico to Canada. It was the northernmost station built in 1942-1943.
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One of the farm buildings. While the station was in use, the cinderblock wall was covered by wooden planks. Courtesy of L. Scott, Redwood National and State Parks.
​Staffed by Army Air Corps troops who were living in Klamath, the small station had three buildings: a power house, an outhouse, and an operations center. Two of these buildings were disguised as farm buildings: one a house and the other a barn to deter detection by the Japanese. There were several small farms and ranches along the coastline at the time, so the presence of another ranch wasn’t suspicious. 35 men ran the station, working in 24-hour shifts. The station was also guarded by military police, three 50 caliber anti-aircraft machine guns in 12-foot diameter pits. 
Over time, there was less of a need to protect the area from the Japanese, so the site because a support site for emergency rescue operations. It operated until the end of WWII and was one of the 22 radar stations that operated to the end of the war. The land passed into private hands for a time before being incorporated into the National Park in 1968. The buildings still stand today and can be visited by the public. ​
​Another mark is located further north, in Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park. Known as the largest WWII memorial in the US, the National Tribute grove is a 5,000 acre grove dedicated in memory of those who died in WWII and was started by the Daughters of the American Revolution, who invested $3,000 of the $26,000 needed to purchase the grove for preservation. The Garden Club of America pitched in to help raise money and the effort was led by Save the Redwoods League, who had spearheaded the memorial grove movement. The project began in 1946 and the names of the donors and people honored by the grove were recorded in a “Golden Book” in the National Archives. The grove was officially dedicated by Newton B Drury on September 25, 1949, who stated that the grove would be a “memorial of eternal gratitude, eternally expressed”. For a time, the exact location of the grove marker had been lost in foliage due to lack of access to the site, but in 2014, the marker was found and moved to a popular day use area near the grove to ensure that the memorial would be easily accessible. 
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National Tribute Grove is on the right side of this photo. The Jedediah Smith Redwoods Campground is on the left side. Photo by Katie Buesch
Information for this post came from the following sources:
Largest WWII Memorial in U.S. Rediscovered in the Redwoods- Save the Redwoods League
Radar Station B-71: Redwood National Park
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Nation's Largest Memorial To WW2 Vets Rededicated At Redwood National And State Parks
Historic California Posts, Stations and Airfields, Klamath River Radar Site B-71 (Crescent City Radar Site B-71, Trinidad Radar Site B-71)
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Artifact Spotlight: Items on Loan

7/15/2018

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This post is part of our ongoing series of posts about our newest exhibit, The Redwoods Provided:  Stories from Redwood National and State Parks​. This week, we'll be checking out some of the incredible items that are on loan to the museum for our exhibit.

The Redwoods Provided is the second main hall exhibit that I've put together since I started working at the Museum last September. One thing I've learned from both the Fraternal Orders exhibit and this new Redwood National and State Park one is that it takes a community to build a truly strong and vibrant exhibit. Through this most recent exhibit, I've had the chance to work with many local groups to borrow items for our display. I'd like to share some of those items and a bit of information about the organizations that made this exhibit- and the stories in the exhibit- come to life.

Old Growth Redwood Chainsaw
Courtesy of Timber Heritage Association

This incredible chainsaw, with a 6 foot bar, was used to cut old growth redwoods in the forests of Humboldt County. It is on loan to the museum during our exhibit from Timber Heritage Association, an organization that is building a world-class collection of logging tools, machinery, and more in Samoa. They're locally known for their Speeder Car rides that run all around the county in the summertime.

NO! Angry Logger Poster
Courtesy of Redwood National and State Parks

When I first started scouting items to borrow for the exhibit, this poster appeared in the Redwood National and State Parks Archives. With it's scowling face and furrowed eyebrows with bold text, I thought it would make a great presentation piece in the exhibit. This photo is a reprint of the original. The Parks Archives loaned us many of the high-impact pieces on display, including the standing map displaying the expansion of the Park, the Clean Logged and Seeded sign in the pro-logging propaganda case, the vibrant photos taken by Don Anthrop throughout the exhibit, and the burls on display in the center of the exhibit. 
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Lucille Vinyard Case
Courtesy of Humboldt State University Special Collections Interns

This case contains a number of personal items from Lucille Vinyard, whom many call the mother of Redwood National Park. Items related to her work to establish the parks can be found at Humboldt State University or online here.
This case offered interns at Humboldt State the opportunity to apply skills from their ongoing internship, sponsored by the National Parks Service, in bringing archives into the public eye. 

KEK Stereoscope
​Donated by Natural Resource Management Corp

This tool was used to map out the expansion of the Redwood National Park in the 1970s and 1980s. it uses aerial photos, mirrors, and magnifying glasses connected to a movable frame to allow the user to trace out the terrain onto a separate map.

These types of tools were used to create what later became base maps for GIS and GPS, and for programs like Google Maps.
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Artifact Spotlight: Redwood Record

7/8/2018

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While putting together our newest exhibit, Museum Assistant Sasha and I were looking through the museum's collection of Redwood items for one of the displays and found this incredible piece: a record made out of Redwood.
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This record, according to the tag included with it, was made by Mr. B. H. Shuemaker, a local from Eureka who had perfected the process of making pieces of redwood into playable records. One side has a story of the history of the redwoods while the opposite side plays Beautiful Dreamer. The record was created in the early 1940s.
This piece is on display in our redwood items case, named the "Redwood Mandala" by Sasha, who organized the case in the exhibit. It includes a number of redwood and redwood burl items, most often sold in the plethora of trinket shops that popped up around Humboldt County with early Redwood tourism. Our plan for this case was to represent some of the more notable features of redwood that made it an in-demand product throughout the early to mid 20th century, along with some examples of what redwood was being used for. The beloved features of redwood for wood workers include its coloration, patterning, straight grain, and resistance to bugs and rot. In the 1960s and 1970s, old growth redwood was being logged mainly for building supplies to support the building boom following the end of World War II, but with increased access to cars and leisure time, people came to the redwoods for vacations and bought trinket items like those displayed.

Stop by and see the Redwood Record and more in our newest exhibit The Redwoods Provide(d): Stories from Redwood National and State Parks
Open now!

The Clarke Historical Museum is open Tuesday-Saturday, 10 am- 6 pm and Sunday 11 am- 4 pm.  
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Artifact Spotlight: Roadtrip! The Orick Peanut

7/1/2018

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For the month of July, we will be featuring items and stories from our new exhibit, The Redwoods Provide(d). This week's artifact spotlight is taking a road trip to Orick. Sometimes known as the gateway to the redwoods, Orick holds an interesting piece of the National Park story, which I discovered while working on research for our new exhibit, which opens this weekend. Enjoy! -Katie Buesch

​Driving into the small town of Orick, you’ll see several interesting pieces of redwood-from roots, to burls, to animals and people-shaped woodcarvings. However, there is one notable piece of redwood that is often overlooked. As you’re driving into town from the south, it is in the parking lot of the Shoreline Market: a mossy, nine-ton piece of redwood that has seen better days. This is the Orick Peanut.
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Dubbed the ‘largest peanut in the world,’ the Peanut’s story begins with discussions about expanding Redwood National Park in the mid-1970s. The expansion bill, like the Redwood National Park establishment bill which passed in 1968, was fought heavily by lumber companies and workers. During the Parks original establishment however, much of the concern was about the unprecedented purchase of privately owned timber land from local companies by the federal government. During the Park expansion discussions, concerns were more oriented around the impact the expanding Park would have on the local logging-based economy. Slogans like “Jobs Grow with Trees” and “Don’t Park Our Jobs” were very popular in opposition of the park expansion. Workers wanted the government to “work for the general welfare [by not expanding the park], don't put us on welfare”.
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In 1977, a nationwide protest called the Talk to America Convoy occurred. 25 semi-trucks loaded with redwood logs, timber products, signs, and equipment drove from Eureka, California to Washington DC, a trip that took 9 days. Leading the protest parade was a red semi-truck with a flatbed trailer carrying the crown jewel of the parade: a piece of roughly hewn and de-barked redwood roughly shaped with a chainsaw and sandblaster to resemble a peanut, which was then named Mr. Peanut. A small sign was attached which read “it may be Peanuts to you, but it’s Jobs to us!” above a larger sign that read “How Much is Enough?”
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The President at the time was Jimmy Carter, known at the Peanut Farmer. Some say the Peanut was meant to be a sarcastic gift to the President, however, one statement from a protestor states the plan for the Peanut was for it to be taken down to the President’s peanut farm in Georgia and displayed with a plaque alongside. One of Carter’s aides refused the gift on behalf of the President, stating that the Peanut an inappropriate use of a redwood. The Peanut was driven back across the country to Orick, where the president of the Chamber of Commerce had agreed to display Mr. Peanut, representing the towns opposition to the expansion of the parks , which was largely viewed as a government takeover. One newspaper however, stated that the state and federal government should pay to build a cover to protect it from the elements. Nowadays, Mr. Peanut resides outside the Shoreline Market out in the open.
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So the next time you're in Orick, stop by to say hi to this lowly legume in the Shoreline Market parking lot. It's humble appearance beguiles a fascinating piece of local history!
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The screenshots featured in this post were taken from the Associated California Loggers documentary "Enough is Enough", which can be viewed online for free here. It's worth a watch! Present day photos of the Orick Peanut were taken by Katie Buesch and Jen Griffin.
I'm a big fan of this story and it's one I'm always looking for more information on. Contact me at caitlyn@clarkemuseum.org if you know anything more about it!

Don't forget to stop by to see the new exhibit and like our Facebook page to see the rest of this month's Redwood National and State Parks posts!

Information for this article is attributed to:
Enough is Enough, 1977 Documentary, freely viewable here.
​Andrew Lord
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    ​Posts created by Katie Buesch, Interim Director-Curator unless otherwise noted.

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Clarke Historical Museum
240 E Street
​Eureka, California 95501
admin@clarkemuseum.org
(707) 443-1947
Open Wednesday-Sunday
11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Closed Monday & Tuesday

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Open until 8:30 p.m. during Friday Night Markets
Open until 9 p.m. during Eureka Arts Alive
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