Monday Update » 3.26.12

Executive Director Andy Hahn with his unusually shy Leo before our urban exploring field trip to the St. Louis Transit Company Substation on Locust this morning.

Happy Monday, everyone!

We had a busy weekend, due in part to the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight madness happening at the Dome. While our weekend manager takes a well-deserved break, here are some newsy bits and a few things we’ve got cooking over the next two weeks:

Campbell House Architects Featured
Campbell House research volunteer Tom Gronski’s article on the Campbell House architects (Joseph C. Edgar and Thomas Waryng Walsh) earned top-billing in the Missouri Valley Chapter of Architectural Historian’s newsletter. Read all about it (and some other beautiful local buildings) here.  Way to go, Tom!

Field Trip to the St. Louis Transit Company Substation
A long-vacant building up Locust was built to house a big, giant battery system for streetcars. It was constructed right before the 1904 World’s Fair because the city anticipated substantially more streetcar traffic due to the influx of visitors. We’ll have a post about our visit to the old building complete with pictures for you next week.

New Civil War Exhibit
Lindsey’s plugging away on research, writing, and finding objects for her new exhibit on the Campbells during the Civil War. Sharing new research on Robert’s political leanings, slavery, and the impact of the war on the family and their friends, the exhibit will open in the third floor galleries in early April. You won’t want to miss it!

A Few Good Interns
We have more intern interviews booked, but we’d love to hear from you or someone you know needs a summer internship. We’re not picky about your course of study because it takes all kinds to operate a museum. Nonprofit Management? Museum Studies? PR/Marketing? History? Art? Come talk to us. Campbell House is a small place, so everyone — staff, volunteers and interns — wear many hats. You’ll get to see all sides of how we run the business, and we promise you’ll have an awesome experience here. Contact Executive Director Andy Hahn at andy [at] campbellhousemuseum [dot] org if you want to talk; we’d love to hear from you!

Upcoming Events
We’re working on putting together two spectacular events that you won’t want to miss. In just a couple of weeks, we’ll again be hosting the Magical Spring Thing at the Mahler Ballroom, which will feature St. Louis Ballet, Union Avenue Opera, the St. Louis Ragtimers, the Ballroom Academy of St. Louis. It’s going to be an unforgettable evening, so click here for more information. On Mother’s Day (May 13th), we’re pleased to partner with Union Avenue Opera to bring you (and your mom!) Arias in the Afternoon: A Victorian Garden Party. While you enjoy scones, tarts and tea from the London Tea Room, Union Avenue Opera artists will serenade you with a special Mother’s Day program. For details, read all about it here.

50-cent piece appearances last week: 0

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Mystery!

Some of our loot.

Put on your thinking caps, because zoinks, we’ve got a mystery on our hands.

We’ve been Tweeting and Facebooking about it as it has been happening, but we’re going to lay the series of events out for you right here. We want to know what you think.

About 6 weeks ago, Director Andy found a 50-cent piece on the front steps of the house, just outside our outer doors. The 50-cent piece was painted gold. A week or so passed, and he found another one with a penny next to it. Soon, we started finding 50-cent pieces every couple of days, either on the front step or on a table inside our garden that can be reached through the fence facing 15th street.

This past Sunday (12/18/11), Weekend Manager Lindsey found one on the front steps when she opened, another one on the steps later in the day, and a third on the table in the garden when she locked up. Today, we found one at the front door at noon (it wasn’t there when we opened at 10:00) and one more when we closed for the day.

We’re stumped.

15th and Locust is a busy intersection during the day. The neighborhood is teeming with high school students from Confluence Academy across the street and residents from Locust, Washington Avenue and other adjacent streets are always out and about and walking their dogs.  Construction workers from the Public Library project are everywhere, and we always have general downtown foot traffic.

Campbell House has had its share of mysteries over the years. We occasionally get mail addressed to members of the family — we’ll post some of those tomorrow — and we’ve always had reports of supernatural activity, but this is the first regular and consistent ongoing puzzle. Because of the 50-cent pieces, we’ve been more enthusiastic than usual to unlock the doors and work in the garden to see what we’ll find.

And maybe this is someone’s Christmas gift to Campbell House. The donation is certainly nice, but what a story! The mysterious donor had given us some excitement over the last few weeks, and we appreciate the daily riddle it brings.

What do you think? Comment here, on our Facebook page, or tweet us at @campbellmuseum. We’re looking forward to your take on this happy little happenstance.