Huge New Collection, Research Center Opens

Wednesday, 31 August 2005 11:36

CHICAGO.- How do you move more than two million ancient artifacts, priceless specimens and large, oddly shaped objects? Very carefully! In any event, The Field Museum will soon take on the huge job. The Museum will officially open its new, climate-controlled, $65-million Collection Resource Center (CRC). Near that date, it will begin the gargantuan task of moving a significant portion of its vast collections -- everything from mummies to meteorites and adzes to zebra skins – from overcrowded storage rooms into the new, long-awaited facility. The job is so big that it will take four years to complete. "The two-story, 186,000-square-foot expansion is nothing less than the finest natural history collection and research center in the world," said John McCarter, Field Museum President and CEO. "In addition to collection areas, it will include scientific laboratories, preparation areas, teaching facilities and workspace for visiting scholars. As such, it will provide a wonderful new scientific base for understanding our precious, world-class collections." Since many of the two million objects to be moved are especially large, the move will free up as much as one-third of The Museum's current storage space, some of which will then be made available for public exhibitions. The heaviest object to be moved is a 9,000-pound Egyptian sarcophagus lid; the lightest would be, perhaps, a Native American bead or African fishhook. Anthropology, Geology and Zoology departments are transferring some of their collections to the new space.

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