Gare CPA Report on Activities During 2017-18To: John Frey, Sarah LaValley, Brian Adams & the CPC Committee
From: Laurie Sanders, Co-Director, Historic Northampton
Date: June 8, 2018
RE: Small Grant: Preservation of The Gare Collection of Silversmithing, Watch Repair Tools and Account Books
Activities to Date
Since receiving this award in December 2016, we have not yet spent any of the funds, but we have moved ahead with ancillary projects, which in turn have given us a much clearer sense
of our specific storage needs for the Gare Collection.
Most significant of all, we have completely renovated the collections storage area below the Damon Education Center. This work, funded in part with other CPA grants and private donations,
has created museum-quality conditions to house a large percentage of the museum’s artifacts.
The renovation included: (1) installing compact storage units; (2) creating a utility room around the furnace, (3) insulating the duct work and walls, (4) purchasing a new, double lined
oil tank, (5) renovating existing shelving, (6) upgrading the electrical systems, and (7) implementing new climate monitoring and controls. The result is that the back basement is now
a professional storage space and the best place to store all of the ledgers (101 items) in the Gare Collection (see images).
In terms of the tools in the Gare collection, in fall 2017 we brought in two consultants—Rick Kerschner, who advised us on climate conditions in our buildings, and Richard Colton, who
organized the tool collection and assessed it in depth.
Their independent findings have changed our thinking about where and how to store the Gare tool collection. Our original grant specifies that we will purchase metal cabinets, and while
we still intend to do this, the units will be (1) different dimensionally to provide better accessibility and improve organization, and (2) for climate reasons, stored in the front
basement of the Damon House (vs back basement with the ledgers).
Explanation of Changes: Climate Issues & the Gare Tool Collection
When we submitted our proposal, our plan was to store both the tools and ledgers in the Collections Storage area below the Damon Education Center. However, after Rick Kerschner inspected
the front and back basements of the Damon Education Center and reviewed the weekly climate data, his recommendation was to store metal tools in the front basement.
Why? It turns out that the front basement experiences greater temperature fluctuations and higher temperatures than the back basement. We tried to abate this by problem by having all
of the furnace duct work double-wrapped during 2018, but when the furnace is running, the temperature in the front basement still reach into the mid-70s F. Those higher temperatures
are fine for metals, glass and ceramics, but are not ideal for artwork, paper, furniture and textiles, which should be stored in rooms with temperatures in the 50-low 60s F.
On the more positive side, we have been able to maintain appropriate relative humidity levels year-rond (RH 35-50% year round). This consistency is possible because of the use of newly-purchased
humidifiers for times when the furnace is running and the use of dehumidifiers from those months when the furnace is off.
Explanation of Changes: Evaluating & Organizing the Tool Collection
In addition to hiring Rick Kerschner, last fall we were fortunate to have the expert assistance of Richard Colton, a local authority on early watch and jewelry-making in America. Over
the course of several visits, Colton assessed and organized the Gare tool collection (528 items).
Colton was already familiar with the Gare Collection, having studied it several years ago as part of his graduate work. Now that he is retired, he was willing to volunteer his time to
this project.
As part of the renovation of the storage area below the Damon Education Center, last summer staff and volunteers had moved the entire Gare tool collection into temporary storage at the
Parsons House. This provided a much better setting for Colton where he could spread out the tools, identify and analyze each piece, and then organize them according to their use and
age (see photo).
Based on this work and his knowledge of collections at other museums and institutions in the Northeast, Colton told us that he’s seen no other collection that compares “in depth and
broadness” to the Gare Collection, and certainly not one associated with a single shop. At other museums, the tools are isolated and/or random donations and
separated in context from where, when and how they were used. In the case of the Gare collection, the tools are in a single place—plus the ledgers are available too. For industrial historians,
Colton says, “it’s almost like an archaeological site.”
During his visits, Colton was able to use a reprint of a 1760s tool catalog to identify many of the tools and their specific function—whether it was for clock and watchmaking, watch
repair, jewelry making or repair, or silversmithing. Particularly noteworthy, he said, was that even when some of the tools were broken, they were kept. As an historian, this allowed
him to interpret and develop a much more thorough understanding of how the shop changed over time—when personal watches were made on Main Street, and then the next phase when the mass
production of watches in other cities forced the Northampton store to shift to retail and repair. (Personal watches became important in the mid-19th century when trains and train schedules
changed the nation. They also became possible because of interchangeable parts and industrialization.)
Using the ages of the tools and their functions as a guide, Colton was able to decipher the stories of the shop’s spoonmaking and jewelry making operations. In the 18th century, a spoon
was a specialty item-- made for an individual and often engraved. By the mid-19th century, larger factories were making cutlery on a scale that made small businesses like the one in
Northampton economically inefficient and unsustainable. The result: spoon making ended and the tools that were used for spoon making were set aside. As both watch and spoon making
ended, the tools reveal that watch repair and sales took over. By the late 19th and early 20th century, watch repair and sales weren’t enough to sustain the business, so the store’s
operations were expanded to include jewelry making and repair. This was the last phase of the shop and what it was best known for when it closed in 1993.
Other highlights noted by Colton:
The tools are high quality.
The tools were kept and passed along, from one owner to the next for more than 250 years “as if just put down and they were going to go to work the next day”;
The rolling mill is “finest example ever seen.”
Next steps in 2018
Re-measure the organized tool collection
Research and purchase properly configured cabinets
Re-arrange the existing items stored in the front basement of Damon so that new cabinets can be installed
Move the tool collection from the Parsons House to the new cabinets
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