The Librarian: the Cup of Gratitude
Dec. 6th, 2006 10:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altivoShades of Noah Wyle! Because I've managed to avoid horrible Wednesday duty for two weeks, I haven't had to deal with the visiting relic until tonight. That is, the Ayer Cup.
Back when the town of Harvard was new, 150 years ago, one of the founders and his wife built a hotel to serve travelers passing through by rail. It was a block from the train station and very modern and up to date in all respects.
Then came the Civil War. The railroad carried Union soldiers to their camps, and brought back the dead and wounded. The Ayers threw open their hotel and restaurant to those soldiers, gratis. Free meals, free beds for anyone in a Union uniform. They continued this for six years, I guess, and even went so far as to retain medical assistance for the wounded and sick soldiers at their own expense, allowing the soldiers to pay for nothing.
After the war was over, the veterans of Wisconsin (the state line is just five miles north of town) joined together to raise money for a thank you gift to be presented to the Ayers. Each soldier was asked to contribute 25 cents. A gold cup about eight inches tall was purchased, and engraved with a thank you inscription to the Ayer family. The cup, and the city of Harvard, are about 150 years old this year.
So I unlocked the fireproof cabinet, took out the white gloves and put them on, then went out to the glass case, unlocked it, carefully lifted the cup from its pedestal, and brought it back to the office area. There I put it into the fireproof cabinet, closed and locked the cabinet itself, removed the white gloves, and went back to lock the display case. I felt like there should be armed guards or something. This in spite that the insurance appraisers evaluated the thing at only about $600.
(The cup is really owned by the Wisconsin Historical Society, which lent it to us this month in honor of the city's sesquicentennial. It stands about 8 inches tall, and I suspect was actually a chalice made for church communion that was sidetracked to this purpose and the inscriptions added. An interesting bit of history that we get to handle with a ritual that rivals anything in "The Metropolitan Library" -- "as seen on TV".)
Back when the town of Harvard was new, 150 years ago, one of the founders and his wife built a hotel to serve travelers passing through by rail. It was a block from the train station and very modern and up to date in all respects.
Then came the Civil War. The railroad carried Union soldiers to their camps, and brought back the dead and wounded. The Ayers threw open their hotel and restaurant to those soldiers, gratis. Free meals, free beds for anyone in a Union uniform. They continued this for six years, I guess, and even went so far as to retain medical assistance for the wounded and sick soldiers at their own expense, allowing the soldiers to pay for nothing.
After the war was over, the veterans of Wisconsin (the state line is just five miles north of town) joined together to raise money for a thank you gift to be presented to the Ayers. Each soldier was asked to contribute 25 cents. A gold cup about eight inches tall was purchased, and engraved with a thank you inscription to the Ayer family. The cup, and the city of Harvard, are about 150 years old this year.
So I unlocked the fireproof cabinet, took out the white gloves and put them on, then went out to the glass case, unlocked it, carefully lifted the cup from its pedestal, and brought it back to the office area. There I put it into the fireproof cabinet, closed and locked the cabinet itself, removed the white gloves, and went back to lock the display case. I felt like there should be armed guards or something. This in spite that the insurance appraisers evaluated the thing at only about $600.
(The cup is really owned by the Wisconsin Historical Society, which lent it to us this month in honor of the city's sesquicentennial. It stands about 8 inches tall, and I suspect was actually a chalice made for church communion that was sidetracked to this purpose and the inscriptions added. An interesting bit of history that we get to handle with a ritual that rivals anything in "The Metropolitan Library" -- "as seen on TV".)
