[MassHistPres] Metropolitan Water Works Museum?

[Aaron Marcavitch]

Dennis, (and anyone else interested),

My mind immediately went to England.  (The Waterworks Museum in Hertford was one answer:
http://www.waterworksmuseum.org.uk/)  Europe has a better concept of dealing with industrial
archaeology.  

But I also think of the one in Baltimore that is a public works museum
(http://www.ci.baltimore.md.us/government/dpw/museum/) - maybe thinking broader than water works. 
Think about all the ways that Boston could be served by a specialized museum like this.  They
tried to do this with Heritage Harbor in Providence, RI - but it didn't work so well.  Slater
Mill, the Museum of Work and Culture in Woonsocket, or the American Precision Museum in Windsor,
VT are all good examples of museums with big mechanical equipment.  In Pittsburgh there are some
efforts to bring back a steel mill.  Bethlehem Steel Works (one of the largest in the world) is
slated to become the Museum of Industrial Heritage.

You could combine an art installation into this as well.  Art and industry sometimes make alot of
sense together.

But I don't think the museum concept is the worng way to think about it.  It will take
fundraising, finding the niche, and tapping the right audiences - but its all very viable in my
mind. I don't really see the difference between house museum and museum - I suppose you are
indicating the difference between a museum which focuses on the history and architecture of a
specific place than a museum which explores the history of a wider topic.  After about 10 minutes
of searching, I found several listings of waterworks museums in Europe or Austrialia.  I found
none in the US.  You could have the first one in the nation to explore the topic of water
processing.  (The Poland Springs building is a good example.) 

Sounds like fun.  
Aaron


> Can you think of a viable model or analogy, of any sort, in New  
> England or elsewhere, for something like this situation -- i.e. a  
> museum with three spectacular but static 100 year old steam  
> leviathans in a wonderful building?

> Is the "museum" model wrong?  Is a better analogy the house-museum  
> (or maybe a fire house museum, of which there must be some, somewhere)?
> 


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http://www.marcavitch.com


 
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