Included in This Newsletter

Join us for the official ribbon-cutting to officially re-open the Old Aurora Colony Museum at 2 p.m., Saturday, August 13, during Aurora Colony Days weekend.

Del Naylor puts the first of two coats of Swedish no-wax lacquer on the 100-year-old maple floor of the Ox Barn Museum.

As soon as the parade is over, we plan to gather for the ceremonial re-opening of your newly remodeled Ox Barn Museum.  It will be a great time for you to thank the dozens of volunteers who have sweated and moved heaven and earth all summer to reach this moment!

 If you’re wondering what remodeling, I hope you will be pleasantly surprised.  We’ve painted the interior of the old Ox Barn.  We’re refinished the century-old maple floorboards.  We’ve vacuumed 40 years of dust from under the stairs.  We’ve constructed a new front porch entryway and poured a new concrete sidewalk out front.  We’ve opened new doors, built new walls, constructed museum risers, and now we’re ready to re-open. 

Ellen McCloskey sews the curtains as other volunteers hang them.

It all started two months ago with your board of directors.  They approved spending almost $25,000 to spruce up the Ox Barn, create storage space, and buy much-needed office equipment.  Another $2,000-plus in unexpected remodeling costs, such as for window treatments, concrete, minor repairs and front porch construction, were paid for – out-of-pocket – by Phillip Yates, Jennie Brown, and your board members, Roberta Hutton, Norm Bauer, Gail Robinson, Jim Kopp and Brian Asher.

Electrician Scott Ruyle performed yeoman’s duty, working both as an employee of New Tech Electric, installing all of the new lighting upstairs and down, as well as a volunteer.  He worked evenings and one Saturday installing lighting and an outlet in the Wash House (Summer Kitchen), and assisted us in many non-electrician capacities, reorganizing the Museum.

 Carpenter Jon Harris contributed dozens of hours of his time building the new front porch entryway, the storage area wall and our museum risers.  He also responded to our emergency call for help when the antique front door hinge finally gave way, an hour or so before closing time!

Mary Ann Moore ponders the next exhibit to go up in the Textiles & Fiber Arts Gallery design.

Literally dozens of ACHS volunteers, led almost every single day the past two months by board member volunteers Norm Bauer and Gail Robinson, and former board member Ginger Swift, put in hundreds of hours, planning and cleaning, painting and redecorating the communal ox barn.  Helen Kraus, stalwart as ever in her support, approved the work but was helpful to remind us, “It is an ox barn!”

There are some differences though.  We have sixty 75-watt spot lights in the history gallery and twenty-eight 75-watt spots in the fiber arts gallery.  The colors of the floors and walls, selected by Gail Robinson, are strikingly rich, and yet, we’re told by our aspiring Colony color expert, Ellen McCloskey, reflect Colony sentiments towards blue and salmon.

Matthew Brown and Travis Branum lug a bucket of paint down the museum stairs.

A dozen women, including Billie Kaiser, Merra Frochen, Ellen McCloskey, Ann Keddie and Gail Robinson, and Matthew Brown, 18, packed us up, with the help of six professional movers led by Tom Humphries. 

Unpacking it all is an even greater challenge.  Special thanks to Chris Flitcroft, Ginger Swift and Ellen McCloskey teamed up with Dorothy Schriever and Mary Ann Moore to design the new textiles and fiber arts gallery.  We deeply appreciate the support and participation, too, of Ila McCallum, Anne Heisler, Nancy Fobert, and others, whose involvement was inspiring.

The new window curtains were hand-sewn by Gail Robinson, Ellen McCloskey and Jennie Brown.

Brian Asher finishes spraying our newly-poured concrete sidewalk that he donated.

Brian Asher, your board president, staked the forms, laid the re-bar, and poured the concrete for your new sidewalk along Second Street in front of the Museum, on his own time and at his own expense, and in full compliance with Aurora’s Historical Review Board specifications!

Matthew Brown and his fellow North Marion High School graduates, Travis Branum and Richie Schnell lifted furniture, sawed, drilled and constructed museum risers, painted and vacuumed, and basically performed the backbreaking work of the remodel.  Phil Yates, an Oregon City attorney, helped us dismantle the Volkswagen-sized lathe upstairs.   

More names will be added in our next newsletter, as will new signage and improvements to our museum displays.  You gotta see the maple flooring to believe it!  Come on down.

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ACHS Awards $500 Scholarship to Brown

North Marion High School graduate Matthew Brown, 18, is the 2005 recipient of the Willie Keil Scholarship.  The ACHS board of directors awarded the $500 scholarship to Matthew in recognition of his academic achievement, and his diverse interests in film and technology, music and computer science.

“The Board saw in Matthew a healthy spirit of inquiry and volunteerism, buttressed by high spiritual and ethical standards that should carry him far,” said Alan Guggenheim, executive director of ACHS. 

Ranked in the top quarter of his class, Matthew graduated with a 3.5 grade point average.  He is interested in studying electrical engineering but also has a penchant for broadcast journalism.  During the past seven years, he has worked as a volunteer at OCTS Channel 5 in Canby, and for the Old Aurora Colony Museum.

“Matthew worked as a volunteer, and later as a summer employee for ACHS, providing major assistance to our remodeling,” Guggenheim said.  “We wish Matthew luck with his studies at Chemeketa College this fall.”

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     Life doesn’t begin until you give a little.  That’s what I learned here at the Aurora Colony.  Suddenly, I was surrounded by other smiling people, solving mysteries, dishing up ice cream, fixing fences, dipping candles, baking yeast bread in a wood stove, filing, computing, desktop publishing, designing museum displays, accessing and conserving 150-year-old Colony artifacts – it’s fun!

We need help in the following areas:

Program Committee
Organizes and promotes history programs related to our new Mission Statement.

Collections
Implements ACHS collection policy, catalogues acquisitions and donations, cares for artifacts in our clean, new storage area of the Ox Barn.

Auction Committee
Plans our major fundraiser of the year!  We also need volunteers for check-in, check-out, set-up and clean-up on the day of next year’s auction.

Membership Committee
Increases membership by reaching out to prospective newcomers and those whose membership has lapsed.

Newsletter Committee
Desktop publishing skills needed.  Help us with museum signage projects, flyers, brochures, mailings and other computer-aided publishing projects.

Quilt Show
Volunteers for set-up, daily operations and clean-up needed for our 33^rd Annual Quilt Show, Oct. 19-23.

Candlelight Tour
In-costume Christmastime festival volunteers needed.  Wear your woolies to help us with crafts demonstrations, exhibits and food service in the Ox Barn complex.   

Jesse Turner and two-dozen volunteers applaud Zane Yoder, the Aurora Colony Historical Society's 2005 Golden Candle Award winner.

Volunteer Social
Help us show our volunteers how much we appreciate them this Dec. 15, 2005, by helping with setting up, cleaning and running this social event.

Stauffer-Will Farm
Give us one day a week for 11 weeks in spring, 2006, and you will smile for the rest of the year!  In-costume re-enactors/teachers direct 2,500 Oregon 4^th graders how to dip a candle, bake yeast bread in a woodstove, quilt, spin and weave, saw tree branches, drill candleholder woodblocks, split cedar shakes (whew!), and sing.

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