On June 14, we hosted some special “little” visitors from one of Wright State’s Discovery Camps. The students, ranging in age from approximately 8 to 10, are participating in the “Night at the Museum Camp,” wherein they will create their own museum at the end of the week. They visited Special Collections and Archives in order to learn more about how archival materials can be used to help tell the stories that bring a museum to life.
The next day, we received thank-you notes from the students. Judging from the contents of these notes, some of their favorite items during the tour were “the old trophy with the giant bat” (the Michelin Trophy, shown below) and the Wright Brothers’ report cards, both of which were mentioned by multiple students.
Here are some photographs of our WSU Discovery Camp visitors:
Learning about the Michelin trophy (photo courtesy of the camp teacher)
Checking out our small exhibit of Jewish artifacts (photo courtesy of the camp teacher)
Piece of Dayton-Wright Airplane fabric alongside photographs of women sewing the same at the factory in 1910 (photo courtesy of the camp teacher)
Hearing the story behind Katharine Wright’s pressed flowers collection
Checking out some of the Wright Brothers’ many medals and awards
Inspecting the report cards of the young Wrights
Testing out the stereopticon viewer (always a crowd pleaser!)
Photographs were taken by SCA staff unless otherwise noted. Photographs taken by the camp’s teacher were used with permission. All students signed waivers allowing their photos to be used in university publicity materials.