'Selected' At Shiloh

Guest curators celebrate museum’s half-centennial

Object -- Bean pot, Mexico, 1950s-1990s Curator -- Margariya Solorzano, executive director of the Hispanic Women's Organization of Arkansas Why she selected it -- "The bean pot (la olla de los frijoles) is a staple item in Mexican kitchens. This simple, undecorated item has a special place in my memory as it reminds me of my hometown and the friendliness of its people. In every house you visit, they ask visitors to share a meal, even if all they have to offer is boiled beans (frijoles de la olla). The aroma of boiling beans transports the imagination to another time and to the variety of dishes that start with beans boiled in the olla de barro."
Object -- Bean pot, Mexico, 1950s-1990s Curator -- Margariya Solorzano, executive director of the Hispanic Women's Organization of Arkansas Why she selected it -- "The bean pot (la olla de los frijoles) is a staple item in Mexican kitchens. This simple, undecorated item has a special place in my memory as it reminds me of my hometown and the friendliness of its people. In every house you visit, they ask visitors to share a meal, even if all they have to offer is boiled beans (frijoles de la olla). The aroma of boiling beans transports the imagination to another time and to the variety of dishes that start with beans boiled in the olla de barro."

It's huge and heavy, black and white, a monstrosity of a machine that no businessman could even imagine using nowadays. After all, our phones have calculators on them, right? This adding machine -- state of the art in its time -- is just a piece of the past of a little town called Pettigrew.

It's also part of "Selected," one of three exhibits this year celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale. The concept was to ask "guest curators" -- representing "different museum audiences" -- to showcase objects that spoke to each of them.

FAQ

‘Selected’

WHEN — 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday, throughout 2018

WHERE — Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale

COST — Free

INFO — 750-8165

Bob Besom, the museum's director emeritus, chose a scrapbook. Monte Harris, an educator at the Rogers Historical Museum, picked a quilt. KUAF's Kyle Kellams selected a school pennant from Winslow to recall a time when smaller communities "were defined, perhaps even anchored, by the school."

And then there's the adding machine. It reflects the Martin family's lifelong relationship with -- and commitment to -- the history of Madison County. It was sold at the auction of the contents of Pettigrew's Mooney-Barker Drug Store in 1986.

For 40 years from 1897 until 1937, the fortunes of Pettigrew turned along with the Frisco freights which came from Fayetteville to export the bounty of the timber-laden Madison County hills. For most of those years -- and well beyond -- the Mooney-Barker Drug Store was a landmark, offering medical care, groceries, Nehi grape soda at the ornate marble soda fountain and country needs from axle grease to gun powder. As it too neared the end of the line, it became a time capsule, filled year by year by fate and the townsfolk it served.

People came from all over the region to buy a little piece of history at the auction -- an operating table, Model T parts, a Magnolia Oil Co. sign. One of Helen Mooney Barker's sons in Ohio kept the teller's cage, which her husband A.P. Barker acquired in a lawsuit against the Bank of Pettigrew when it collapsed in 1931. The soda fountain had already gone to Har-Ber Village, a museum in Grove, Okla. And many, many items went to the Shiloh Museum, thanks to the partnership forged between its director and Helen Mooney Barker's grandson, Wayne Martin, who was passionate about the preservation of Pettigrew's past.

Martin, who died in 2010, always worked to preserve the history of Pettigrew, whether that meant raising funds for the one-room school turned community building, visiting students to talk about the timber industry, donating or loaning pieces of the past for exhibits at the museum or spearheading Pettigrew Day, the annual homecoming and celebration of the town's boom days. The adding machine was chosen to remember him, and this story was "Selected" to run today because it's Father's Day -- and he was my dad in everything but blood.

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Object -- Burroughs adding machine, Bank of Pettigrew (1907-1930), Pettigrew (Madison County), ca. 1926 Curator -- Becca Martin-Brown, Features editor, NWA Democrat-Gazette Why she selected it -- "I knew I wanted something from the Pettigrew collection to honor my father- and mother-in-law, Wayne and June Martin. The adding machine, originally from the Bank of Pettigrew and sold at the Mooney-Barker Drug Store auction, was eventually donated to the Shiloh Museum by the buyer."

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Object -- Cine-Kodak Model K movie camera, Eureka Springs (Carroll County), 1930-1946 Curator -- Glenna Booth, Office of the Mayor, Eureka Springs Why she selected it -- "I am interested in the auto-age culture that was built around what is now U.S. Highway 62 east and west of Eureka Springs. This highway changed the type of visitors to our town from health-seekers wanting healing from the springs to automobile travelers wanting to see the unique architecture and terrain of Eureka Springs. This Kodak camera is an icon reflective of these new visitors who wanted to personally document their adventures."

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Photo courtesy Shiloh Museum The glory days of the train and timber community of Pettigrew came to life one last time on a winter Saturday in 1986, when the contents of the Mooney-Barker Drug Store were sold at auction. The event marked the beginning of a lifelong friendship between Wayne and June Martin, pictured that winter in front of the store, and the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale. "Selected," currently on exhibit, includes a tribute to the store and the family.

NAN What's Up on 06/17/2018

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