Behind the scenes: How Upcountry History Museum stores, preserves artifacts

At the Upcountry History Museum, visitors are transported back in time as they look at both permanent and temporary exhibitions.

While the facility showcases many artifacts, there are various pieces located in its basement, and it is up to museum staff to safely store them when they are not displayed.

What’s in the basement

Located in the museum is its collections room, a climate- and humidity-controlled space with no natural light, is a treasure trove of donated items with a connection to Upstate or South Carolina history, such as sewing machines, doll houses, a Dixie Drive-In sign, various textiles, furniture and a horse-drawn hearse.

To ensure the integrity of these items, the room’s lights are off when no one is inside, an exterminator regularly treats the museum and newly donated items like textiles are kept in a separate space for several weeks to ensure that no bugs are introduced.

“Sometimes we get big boxes of things from people’s attics or basements, so before we bring anything into this room, we make sure it’s clean as it can be for what it is,” said Martha Wiley, collections manager with the Upcountry History Museum.

Calling in an expert

Since the collections room houses items not regularly seen by the public, museum staff will evaluate what is on hand when planning to supplement visiting exhibitions with local items.

Sometimes, an item might need to be worked on before it can be displayed, and an expert is called in.

For the horse-drawn hearse, which dates back to around the 1890s and was used by the former R.D. Jones and Sons funeral home in Simpsonville, the museum contracted conservator Sharon Penton to work with this item so it would be ready to go on display.

Penton came to the museum to preserve the hearse in its current condition by cleaning and painstakingly removing electrical tape from its wheels and stabilizing the torn leather flap on its driver’s seat.

“There’s a blurred line between conservation and restoration,” Penton said. “In restoration, people are thinking of restoring it and making it shiny and new looking like it originally did. In conservation, you’re just taking it back so far. You want to stabilize it, but you don’t want to change the history of the object.”

Following Penton’s work, she was able to secure all four wheels with black cotton twill tape and the hearse is slated to make its first appearance at the museum’s upcoming “Beyond Halloween Land: Tim Burton’s ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’” exhibition, which will open Oct. 18.

The hearse will be on display from Oct. 28 to Nov. 9. For more information, visit upcountryhistory.org.