Now that the exhibit is closed and I can finally talk about it, I want to share more about a fun project that I had the ability to take on while volunteering with the education department at Nauticus.
Each year, Nauticus plays host to Dicken's Christmas Towne, a wonderful Christmas themed village with caroling, hot chocolate, candy canes, and vendors galore. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Christmas Towne could not happen this year indoors. Many of us have had to get creative about how we do things this year, and Nauticus was no exception.
From mid-November to the beginning of January, Nauticus was home to Winterfest on the Wisconsin. The battleship was decked out in thousands of strands of Christmas lights, all in different shapes and sizes. The ward room was covered in massive gingerbread houses that rose off the tables. The doorways were covered in wrapping papers and wreaths. The entire boat looked like something out of Christmas Vacation.
I started volunteering with Nauticus in October 2020. I started out by teaching programs about different sea creatures, how battleships are cleaned and maintained, pollution and more. However, being the military history nerd that I am, I wanted to contribute more to the battleship as well.
In 2014, I took a video production class during my grad school studies at Sacred Heart University. During the eight week class, we had to determine our final project pretty early on. The only rule we had was that we had to produce a project that inspired us. I loved writing about military and Navy history so I decided to interview my stepdad, a Battleship Wisconsin veteran. I interviewed him, found a voiceover artist for the mini documentary and combined photos and video footage to turn it into Battleship Sailors: Their Stories.
Ever since that project in grad school, I have wanted to continue the series and find many more veterans to interview. I vocalized this to my supervisors at Nauticus and they loved the idea, but weren't sure they had the space to archive everything at the current time. However, they were looking for a program to help educate the public on what the holidays looked like for sailors during the years.
May I present, Deck the Hull.
Deck the Hull exhibit, Nauticus 2020
The undertaking of the Deck the Hull exhibit was something I did not expect so early on in my volunteer program at Nauticus. However, I threw myself into the project and got started right away.
I emailed about 10 other museum ships and compiled holiday information about them from their curators. I had tons of photos, videos, and stories from museum ships around the US about the holiday season for their sailors. Many of the stories and photos I received were from the World War II era.
Since the ship had been decked out in Christmas lights, the education department staff and I worked together to give the public who were visiting during the day a better understanding of what was going on with the outside of the battleship. During the day, the battleship looks like it's been covered in wires and string; you don't see the magic until it's dark outside. Deck the Hull gave the daytime public visitors a chance to see the holiday season from the perspective of a sailor.
After compiling all the information from the other ships I had to decide how to display it all and what would work best. Due to COVID-19, the museum was trying to eliminate any kind of congregating. Wanting to help in the mission, I decided that one sheet with two bullet points of information would be sufficient. I wanted the pictures to speak for themselves.
I created a section on the holiday menus from the mess deck and how even though each meal was the same (turkey and the fixings), it gave the sailors a chance to have a taste of home. To rise morale, I also educated the guests on the history of the USO and the Christmas shows that took place on board different ships. I also highlighted the stars who came to visit the troops. There was also a ton of information available on Operation Decorama, the Norfolk Navy Yard's annual light contest, where Battleship Wisconsin's sister ship, the USS Iowa, took home first place many times. Of course, Christmas wouldn't be complete without a letter and card home to the family. I also had a section dedicated to the different Christmas cards that sailors would send home during the holiday season to their loved ones.
The response to the exhibit has been overwhelmingly positive. People have commented many times about how informative it is and that it ties in well with the holiday theme of the boat. That's music to my ears.
Deck the Hull wouldn't have been possible if I didn't speak up and advocate that this was something I had an interest in. You cannot expect people to read your mind so if there is a project out there that you want to bring to life; speak it into existence! I'm sure glad I spoke up!
Signing off,
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