FRONT LINES - Oregon Military Museum

BRIGADIER GENERAL JAMES B. THAYER
OREGON MILITARY MUSEUM
15300 SE Industrial Way  Camp Withycombe
Clackamas, Oregon 97015
Phone (503)683-5359  Fax (503)683-4913  DSN 355-5359
www.oregonmilitarymuseum.org
The Oregon Military Museum Monthly Report
February 8-March 4, 2013
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FRONT LINES
The Oregon Military Museum Monthly Report
Report
June 6-July 5, 2012
UPCOMING EVENTS:
June 6-July 5, 2012 The Oregon Military Museum Monthly
Planning is in process for two major upcoming events. Please mark
your calendars and make plans to join us for:
The Oregon Military Museum Monthly Report
 Saturday April 20th is the 2013 All-Star Salute, benefiting
June
6-July 5,
2012
the
Capital
Campaign
of the Brigadier General James B. Thayer
Oregon Military Museum and celebrating Oregon’s proud military
heritage. For more information, please visit:
July 6 – August 2, 2011
www.allstarsalute.com/2013-all-star-salute/

FRONT LINES
FRONT LINES
 The 17th Annual Armed Forces Day / Living History Day at
Camp Withycombe will be Saturday May 18, 2013. 
July 6 – August 2, 2011
America’s Military History Comes Alive!
Honoring All U.S. Veterans


th
17 Annual
Armed Forces Day / Living History Day
Camp Withycombe - Clackamas, Oregon
Saturday May 18, 2013
Sponsored by:
Military Vehicle Collectors Club of Oregon & Brigadier General
James B. Thayer Oregon Military Museum

Come join us for the Annual Armed Forces Day/Living History Day.
This is a FREE public event.
Hours are 9:00am to 5:00pm, Saturday, May 18, 2013.
Displays include:
 Restored military vehicles from bicycles to battle tanks,
from World War I to the present.
 Authentic military campsites and displays of uniforms, arms
and equipment.
 Living History enthusiasts, reenactors, military vehicle
collectors, ready to share their knowledge of military history
throughout America’s past.
Please note: Drivers must have a valid Driver’s License to enter
Camp Withycombe. All adults need to present a valid form of
identification.
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RECENT HAPPENINGS:
 A new membership opportunity has been created to benefit the Museum! To
receive the new Membership brochure, please drop us an email or call
503-683-6161. Our thanks to all involved in making the new brochure!
It looks great!
 Meetings continue with architect Don Stastny and his team. New additions and
many refinements are being made to the earlier Museum concept drawings and
floor plan schematics. New models and updated drawings are being created.
We will soon be able to share them with you.
 Many hours have been spent this month contributing to the draft of a new
Oregon Army National Guard Regulation that establishes and implements the
Museum’s policies, practices, and standards.
 A few Museum team members were fortunate to meet with several staff of the
very impressive Army Heritage Education Center (AHEC), at Carlisle Barracks,
Pennsylvania. Topics of discussion included fund raising, exhibition
development, fabrication, and installation, styles of learning and use of
technology in exhibits ( such as holography, as below), display case
specifications for preservation, digital archives management, and achieving
museum climate standards for both archives and artifacts. We sincerely thank
the AHEC staff for their generous gift of time and expertise.


Thanks to project manager Gary Van Drew, we have received a nice “gently used” conference table for the
classroom. We are getting ready to have a few small displays there as well.

 Ultraviolet light filters have been placed in our new
collection storage areas. Thanks to the 2004 grant from the Army
Historical Foundation, we were able to purchase them for the old
museum building. The filters
have a total life expectancy of 10
years, and will need to be
replaced in two years.

We have brought the
World War I German 210mm
Krupp Howitzer (Lange Mörser)
indoors. After just recently being
painted, new rust was already quickly reforming. The howitzer was a
war trophy issued to the State of Oregon after its captured at MeuseArgonne and shows battle damage. To our chagrin, the warmer
indoor environment awoke the yellow jackets that had set up house
inside it! The barrel and part of the mount were quickly bagged, and
insect traps have resolved the issue.
Four fairly large model aircraft have been returned to the Oregon
Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI), with our thanks for the
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

loan. The aircrafts’ removal opened up a large space on the Drill Floor (future Main Exhibit Hall).
We are saddened by the loss of
two 41st Infantry Division combat
veterans who were good friends to
the Museum, Dr. George Timmons
and David W. Herd, Jr. George
served with the 186th Infantry
Regiment and played the trombone
in the 186th Band. David was one
of a group of Oregon City High
School graduates to enlist in the
National Guard in 1939, joining
Company D, 186th Infantry
Regiment.
This month, 6 researchers were assisted.
IN PROCESS:





Unpacking remains our top priority as time permits
between meetings and events! This month we unpacked another
300 objects. That’s approximately 650 artifacts since the
unpacking process began. The
majority of these are large,
heavy and/or cumbersome
artifacts, that require more time
to unpack. We have kept up
with all the data entry required
to note all the new home
locations for these objects in
our two databases.

A great deal of reorganizing is occurring as well. Pallets of uncatalogued library materials
and objects are now in one place; all excess furniture has been moved
into the old mess hall; emptied packing materials are being sorted into
piles for recycling or for later re-use; and macro-artifacts are now
becoming accessible. Our continuing thanks goes to the dedicated corps
of volunteers for assisting us.
Preparations are underway for our annual hazardous materials and
environmental compliance inspection, (i.e. making sure all inventories,
MSDS sheets, and product quantities are up to date). Ms. Daly has done
a great job, with zero findings for the past few years.
We continue daily monitoring to see if the HVAC systems are running properly, to monitor the relative
humidity in a total of seven zones and adjust as needed, and to look for leaks. We now have an alarm screen
on the digital controls that help us realize that an issue has arisen. There are still several issues being
worked out, but…We can’t say thank you enough to the State Shop and the contractors in helping us
respond quickly when facility issues arise. The most recent concerns include 75 alarms on one of the
HVAC fans, and a urinal that would not stop running - the last time that the adjacent commode
malfunctioned and ran for a long period of time, the floor drain backed up more than 55 gallons of “water.”
Almost complete are the renewals of all incoming and outgoing loans. We are working with the Deputy
Chief of Staff for Operations and Training for one remaining loan.
Supplies needed for unpacking and day-to-day operations have arrived, including two additional dataloggers
for areas that contain artifacts and archives.
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
New Home for an Army Escort Wagon
An exciting new artifact, a horse-drawn U.S.
Army Escort Wagon, is making its way to the
Brigadier General James. B. Thayer Oregon
Military Museum. The donation comes from
Curtis Trailers, Inc., a Portland company
founded by Myron and Betty Lou Curtis.
One of Myron’s wishes was that the Army
Escort Wagon be donated here. Since their
parents’ passing, the children, Myron, Jr.,
Cammy, Mylo, and Carley are making sure that
their parents’ wishes are being met. Family
members are working on donating much of the
collection to various museums and public
entities, such as the recent donation of a
beautifully restored 1904 Nott Steamer Fire
Engine to Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue.
Myron and Betty Lou Curtis began
collecting horse drawn trailers and wagons in
the early to mid-1960s. The collection grew to
include fire-related items, and then military-related vehicles and equipment. The large private museum on
the company’s business site on SE Powell Boulevard has been called a hidden treasure by those fortunate
enough to see the more than 150 transportation vehicles and wagons.
The Army Escort Wagon is iconic of the days before motorized vehicles became commonplace. These
wagons were approved by the Secretary of War on November 21, 1878, but actually saw service through the
1930s. Drawn by four mules or four horses, the Army Escort Wagon replaced the Civil War’s six-mule
wagons.
This World War I era wagon still has its original
manufacturing data visible, showing it was produced by
the International Harvester Corporation. According to
the U.S. Army Transportation Museum, 100,000 of
these wagons were ordered for the war effort, requiring
the participation of the entire wagon-making industry.
Only 38,000 were ever delivered. A common sight on
military posts, the wagons could even be seen taking
children to school, delivering milk, or picking up a
soldier’s family at the local railroad station.
The Army Escort was used throughout Oregon, even
at Camp Withycombe and Camp Clatsop (Camp Rilea). Unfortunately, during World War I in France, the
mix of motorized units and animal-drawn wagons often became giant tangles, as trucks and wagons tried to
move supplies forward through heavy traffic, in bad weather, and on bogged-down muddy roads.
RELATED WEBSITES TO VISIT:
 Again, thank you for your support and interest! If you wish to join our email list to be notified when new
reports have been posted online, please email us at [email protected]
 Museum:
www.oregonmilitarymuseum.org
 Capital Campaign:
www.allstarsalute.com
 Foundation:
www.historicaloutreach.com
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2013 CALENDAR / UPCOMING EVENTS:

Mar 14
Environmental Compliance Inspection

Apr 4
Daly is presenting a textile preservation workshop that is being co-hosted by the Oregon
Museums Association and Registrars Committee-Western Region. It will be held at the 41st
Infantry Division Armed Forces Reserve Center (AFRC), Camp Withycombe.

Apr 20
All-Star Salute to the Oregon Military, Governor Hotel, Portland.

May 11
West Point Society meeting and tour, Museum and AFRC.

May 16
Armed Forces Day at the State Capitol, Salem.

May 18
17th Annual Living History Day at Camp Withycombe.

May 30
Oregon Heritage Commission’s Preservation Month Fair at the State Capitol, Salem.
PERIOD: February 1, 2013 – February 28, 2013
DATA LOGGERS:
Museum Standards:
 Stable temperature and relative humidity are needed to preserve historic artifacts, photos & documents.
 The goal is to maintain 68° F and 50% relative humidity (RH), except vaults’ RH should be at 40%.
Temperature and/or RH should not swing more than +/-5 within a 24 hour period, since these swings are
what cause major deterioration.
 Green highlights indicate when and where all standards were met. Yellow highlights indicate violations of
standards during the time period listed, by being off goal (too hot or cold, too high or low RH).
 Outside Temperature – High 61, Low 31
Quick Look:
Fluctuations of more than 5° or 5% occurred within a 24 hour period this many times:
Collections:
1 of 28 days
Library:
1 of 28 days Vault 6101-2:
Art Storage:
1 of 28 days
Drill Floor Stage: 18 of 28 days Vault 6410:
Textiles Storage: 28 of 28 days
Vault 6101-1:
0 of 28 days
LOGGER
NO.
2307219
2307220
2307221
2307222
2307223
2307224
2307225
2307226
February 1, 2013 – February 28, 2013
LOGGER
HIGH
LOW
AV
HIGH
LOC.
TEMP
TEMP
TEMP
RH
66.90
Collections
68.01
66.37
51.67
67.89
Art Storage
69.11
67.05
50.61
Textiles
67.20
71.51
64.83
53.60
Storage*
70.44
Library
72.37
69.62
48.00
67.41
Drill Floor
70.65
65.34
47.18
68.23
Vault 6101-1
68.93
67.56
40.94
66.65
Vault 6101-2
67.22
66.37
44.53
64.96
Vault 6410
66.71
60.37
45.68
LOW
RH
44.69
42.26
AV
RH
47.09
45.35
42.90
47.94
39.66
31.25
37.49
39.64
43.90
45.43
38.65
40.35
41.97
45.07
1 of 28 days
0 of 28 days
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