Into the Deep

Hello Readers! Hope you all are enjoying the holiday season.  We’ve been incredibly busy around the museum getting ready for all the exciting things we will be bringing you next year. Don’t forget that the next couple of weeks are the last to come visit the museum before we close on January 1^st. So come take this last chance to see the Home Grown Exhibit!

We will reopen again March 1^st of 2015, and soon after that we’ll have the grand opening of The Grand Prairie Story, our brand new main exhibit, on March 15^th and then Hidden Underfoot: Historical Archaeology in Illinois will open on April 19^th. We hope you’ll come visit us for those as well!

We had a lot of great guesses on the last mystery object, and several people on social media guessed correctly!  Hopefully we get some good guesses this week as well with the new object. Here it is:

This object is made of metal and has two oval sections, with 7 metal bands. It’s hinged at one end with a simple lock on the other. There is a long wire handle attached at the other end.  It’s roughly 2 feet in length.

The object also as the words “Lewis Holmes, Keene, NH” and “Patented March 24, 1868” written in raised text on the edges of the object.

Here’s another look from the side:

Do you have any guesses as to what this object might be?