March Newsletter - Kitsap History Museum

**KHM March Newsletter**

Museum News

Launching a new series!

In partnership with the Kitsap Regional Library, the Museum is hosting a new series called Perspectives.

Join us in a conversation about perspectives in historical narratives. Kitsap History Museum will choose an artifact from our permanent collection and begin a discussion between members of the community about what the artifact means to them. Attendees are encouraged to join in the discussion to illustrate how personal experience, background, culture, and other factors influence how we experience and interpret historical events.

See below for details on our first event!

New Special Exhibit Coming Soon:

The Journey to Kitsap

Image: Churn pot brought to Washington Territory (between 1853-1889) via covered wagon. State of origin unknown. KHM archives, 1957.011.002.

Learn about the development of Kitsap communities in “The Journey to Kitsap,” our upcoming exhibit about migration and immigration to Kitsap County. The exhibit will highlight family heirlooms, photographs, and documents that Kitsap families brought with them from other parts of the world and the country. Examine the political, cultural, and economic factors that pushed families away from their lifelong homes to settle in Kitsap County.

Do you have a family heirloom of any type (objects, books, clothing, oddities and curiosities, etc.) that has traveled over miles and through generations to call Kitsap County “home?” Our curator would love to hear from you and learn your family’s story. Contact Jeanine Greco at [email protected] if you have a special item that you’d like to lend to bring this exhibit to life.

Up Next

Lobby Exhibit for First Friday

Image: Emma-Lindsay Squier in 1923. Accessed at https://lakechapalaartists.com/?p=3239

Our March lobby exhibit will feature author Emma-Lindsay Squier, who lived in Kitsap County in her teenage years and wrote the American Classic, The Wild Heart. The exhibit will be based on the recollections of her cousin, Miriam Richey. Miriam and Emma-Lindsay lived together with their families in Port Orchard. Her nephew Stephen Block recently donated this document as written from Miriam’s recollections by Aileen Block. The exhibit will open on Friday, March 3 at 5pm and will be in our lobby through the month of March.

Second Saturday Kids Day: Bugs & Buds

Drop by March 11th

12:00-4:00pm

This month we’ll have a spring themed craft and a local face painter, Cherisse Major, will be onsite! Bring the little ones down to experience the exhibits and keep them busy with the day’s activity. Join us every Second Saturday for a hands-on craft or game suited for grade school kids.

Note: March 11th is also the St Patrick’s Day Parade in downtown Bremerton! Starting at 11am.

Perspectives: WWII V-Mail

This program is presented in partnership with Kitsap Regional Library.

Thursday, March 23rd

7:00-8:00pm

In this new series, we’ll explore how different objects can take on different meanings through a individual’s unique frame of reference. The object for March will be a series of letters sent via V-Mail (military) during WWII. We will have two speakers from different backgrounds begin the dialogue of how they personally relate to the letters. Attendees are encouraged to join in the discussion to illustrate how personal experience, background, culture, and other factors influence how we experience and interpret historical events.

Previously On

History UnCorked: The Legacy of Emmett Till

Snow threatened to cancel our event, but we persevered! The small group in attendance had great dialogue as historian, guest curator, and KHM board member Roosevelt Smith discussed his recent visit to the Emmett Till Interpretive Center in Sumner, Mississippi. Together we explored how the 14 year old’s murder in 1955 has impacted Black communities nationwide.

A recording of this presentation can be found by clicking the image below:

Volunteer Opportunities

Support the Museum by lending a hand in a variety of capacities. This month we could use help with the following activities:

First Friday Art Walk: March 3rd 5:00-7:00pm – Greeting and socializing with guests

St Patrick’s Day Parade: March 11th 10:00am-12:00pm – Join the Kitsap History Museum as we walk in the Parade!

Second Saturday Kids Day: March 11th 12:00-4:00pm – Support our kids activity table by connecting with families and demonstrating crafts

Saturday Cleaning: March 18th 12:00-2:00pm – Tidy the Museum with dusting, sweeping, vacuuming, cleaning bathrooms and kitchenette.

Thursday Perspectives: March 23rd 6:00-9:00pm – Assist with set up for food and drinks, tables and chairs, greet guests, registration check-in, event clean up

Interested in helping out? Email us with the shift that you’d like to sign up for at [email protected] or call us 360-479-6226

Spotlight on Carolyn LaFountaine

KHM Archives: 2002.070.004

X-Ray machine from Christensen’s Shoe Store

I started volunteering with the Museum in 2001. It was short after we moved to the Bremerton location and we were installing new shelving in the basement. I was in charge of creating and filling the storage boxes. After that project, I became intimately linked to the collections and have been working in the Archives ever since.

I get to see so much cool stuff, I just love it. It’s important to save history and it’s clear to me the value it has in the community by how many people continue to donate items and how many people come to experience the museum. I like being apart of that.

We have an old tickertape and a X-ray machine from Christensen’s Shoe Store on Pacific that was used in the 40s and 50s to determine shoe fit and bone structure! I love all of the textiles in our collection as well. One of my favorite donations were artifacts of Carl Nelson’s. It was fun piecing together several generations of stories from South Kitsap within that one family.