Celebrating museum Standards

The Standards 2012 program officially drew to a close with a wonderful Celebration event hosted by the Adelong Alive Museum. After a delicious lunch served in the adjacent Adelonia Theatre, Mayor Trina Thomson welcomed and commended the 9 museums from the Eastern Riverina that had taken part in the year long program of self-assessment. Her opening acknowledgement of country was heart-felt and set a warm and respectful tone for the rest of the proceeding.  She congratulated the museums for their achievements and acknowledged the valuable contribution that volunteers play in keeping, preserving and interpreting unique local stories. The Mayor presented each museum with a certificate of completion.

The museums that took part in the Standards 2012 Program include:

• Adelong Alive Museum
• Batlow Museum
• Greens Gunyah Museum (Lockhart)
• Museum of the Riverina (Wagga Wagga)
• Temora Rural Museum
• The Pioneer Women's Hut (Tumbarumba)
• Tumut Historical Society Museum
• The Up To Date Store (Coolamon)
• Wyalong Museum 

Feedback from the paid staff and volunteers who took part in the program indicated that while some may have felt daunted by the amount of work required at the start of the program, they found that the self-review surveys provided a welcome opportunity to have a close look at their strengths and weaknesses, to re-examine their policies and procedures and to reprioritise the use of their resources. The networking opportunities presented by the various workshops throughout the year were also greatly appreciated.

Museums & Galleries NSW takes this opportunity to congratulate the museums and the dedicated people who took part in the Standards Program. 

For more information on the Standards Program please visit the M&G NSW website. 

A story by Tamara Lavrencic.

Image 1: The 2012 Standards Program Participants outside Adelong Alive Museum.

Image 2: The team from the Tumut Museum receive their certificates and Final Reports from Mayor of Tumut Shire Trina Thomson.

Image 3: Lunch time was a great opportunity for networking and sharing experiences from the Standards Program.

Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group

Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group meeting at Simmo's Museum, Glen Davis.

The Lithgow area is a hidden gem of history and heritage. Visitors and locals alike can enjoy the history of one of the most fascinating areas in Australia through the many museums, historic sites and heritage organizations. From aboriginal history through to the history of the Small Arms Factory and from Hartley through to Glen Davis there are sites and museums to learn about aboriginal, convict, mining, social, railway and factory history.

In March 2012 a group of museum and heritage organization operators from the Lithgow LGA met at Eskbank House and Museum to have a chat about how they could help each other out. From this initial gathering the Lithgow Museums’ Networking Group was formed. The group meets monthly and our aims are: educating each other to improve the quality of our museums, networking to promote each other’s museums and share resources, co-operating to create a combined museum experience for visitors and sharing enthusiasm and to enjoy each other’s company as museum and heritage enthusiasts. It is exciting to be able to work together, take strength from each other and present a combined museums  experience to visitors and locals.

There are 12 organisations in the group, some able to attend regularly others coming when they can or contributing via email, etc. The groups include: Lithgow and District Family History Society (LDFHS), Lithgow Small Arms Factory Museum (LSAFM), Simmo’s Museum, Eskbank House and Museum, Lithgow Library Learning Centre (LLLC), Lithgow State Mine Heritage Park, Lithgow State Mine Railway Ltd, Hartley Historical Village, Portland History Group, Rydal Village Association, Delta Expo and Newnes Pub. Each organisation takes turns hosting the meetings and this has been an invaluable part of getting to know each other’s museums and being able to share resources and promote other museums to visitors.

The group has participated in several group activities aimed at increasing visitor numbers to museums and generally get the word out that Lithgow’s Heritage is amazing and worth a visit. 

Our first activity was an Open Day for many of the museums in the group on International Museums Day 2012. International Museums Day is in May and is celebrated by over 30 000 museums throughout the world.  With a short time to organize and limited advertising most museums still saw an increase in visitation on the day of over 500 %. The group has more plans for International Museums Day 2013 and also celebrating other international days like Volunteers Day 2012 with an afternoon tea for the wonderful volunteers in all our organizations.

The next group activity was a combined stall at Daffodils at Rydal. Photos from the different organizations were displayed and pamphlets and postcards were handed out along with our first Lithgow Heritage Newsletter outlining heritage events happening in September and October in the region. The most rewarding part of the day was talking to people about the museums and history and hearing their stories of the area. Perhaps this is infact the most rewarding part of running a museum in general.

Our next event was another stall at the Back to Hartley Celebrations on Sunday 28 October 2012. This time we included a “What is it?” table with a variety of mysterious objects for people to ponder, a “Who is it?” display of historic photos of Lithgow Citizens with room for people to comment, displays from the museums and projected historical images of the Lithgow area. Of course the most interesting part of our stall was talking heritage and history and spending time with other museum enthusiasts.

Our Christmas party will be a well earned reward for all the hard work, much of it voluntary, that all the organization participants put in to operating their museums and preserving and presenting to the public the wonderful history that is Lithgow. 

Jan Saundercock

Lithgow and District Family History Society

A Night to Celebrate: The 2012 IMAGinE Awards

All photography by Mimi Kelly.

By all accounts the 2012 IMAGinE Awards presentation was a huge success. With a 20% increase in the number of nominations, a revised presentation format and bubbly enthusiasm expressed by over 100 guests, who enjoyed the hospitality of White Rabbit Gallery – it was certainly a night to remember.

The evening commenced with an Award that recognised Uncle Roy and Aunty June Barker’s Liftetime Volunteer Contribution, having devoted their lives to the preservation and sharing of Aboriginal history and cultural knowledge. The award was accepted by members of their family following a moving tribute given by Steve Miller, M&G NSW’s Manager of Aboriginal Programs.  Queanbeyan and District Historical Museum Society were then announced as winners of the Volunteer Collection Management Category, closely followed by an Award given to the Corrective Services Museum, Cooma, in the Collection Management Category for 1-4 paid staff.

Western Plains Cultural Centre’s recently completed de-accessioning project saw some 1000 items removed from the collection. Such was the manner in which this project was undertaken and given the sustainable advantages it bestowed to ongoing WPCC programs, our judges had no hesitation in giving the Collection Management (5-20 staff) Award to Dubbo.

The exemplary programs developed by Port of Yamba Historical Society were acknowledged by giving the volunteer run Exhibitions & Public Engagement Award to their World War II at Home exhibition. Goulburn Regional Gallery won the same category for 1-4 staff and Sydney University’s The Nicholson Museum won the 5-20 staff award category.

The 21+ staff award for Exhibitions and Public Engagement was hotly contested. Following detailed consideration the judges settled on awarding it to The Australian Maritime Museum for their hugely popular Nawi – exploring Australia’s Indigenous watercraft exhibition.

Category 3, for Education and Audience Development 1-4 paid staff, was given to Grafton Regional Gallery for their Towards the Stratosphere drawing project. It involved six local schools in the production of a 25 square metre drawing that reflected known and unknown aspects of the environment. The 4-20 paid staff award in this category went to Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery and the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, won the 20+ staff category for their Bella Room project.

The individual achievement categories were also hotly contested with the paid staff category being shared between Dr Nick Lomb, from Sydney Observatory and Elizabeth Ann Macgregor OBE, Director Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. The volunteer award for Individual Achievement proved hugely popular for its recognition of the work of Ken Smith, Past President and Secretary of the Parramatta and District Historical Society.

The evening ended with hearty congratulations to all winners and a renewed enthusiasm for the way museums and galleries involve and support their communities throughout the state. 

From all of us at M&G a big thank you goes to all nominations for the way in which programs and projects are conceived and undertaken. 

Michael Rolfe
CEO