82Rigger
08-20-2005, 04:35 PM
New York museum works to preserve rare 18th century artifacts.
ALBANY, New York (AP) -- The major general was so well known that even his abbreviated signature -- "B. Arnold" -- was sufficient on a pass to ensure anyone safe passage.
But in September 1780 that signature sealed Benedict Arnold's fate, as the American hero of Saratoga became America's most infamous traitor.
The passes he scrawled for "John Anderson" -- the alias of John Andre, a British spy -- are among the most treasured items among the thousands of Revolutionary War documents and relics in the state library and archives in the New York State Museum.
Now, thanks to a nearly $164,000 matching grant from Save America's Treasures, a public-private partnership between the National Park Service and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the museum can work to preserve fragile artifacts. Those include the Arnold note and one of George Washington's dress swords.
With one-third of the Revolutionary War's battles fought in New York state, the archive is a major repository for historic materials from that era, according to officials involved in the preservation project.
"It speaks to the tremendous emotional connection New Yorkers feel to the Revolutionary War, much in the way Southerners connect to the Civil War," said Robert Bullock, director of the Archives Partnership Trust, a not-for-profit organization affiliated with the state archives.
In a large, well-lit lab in the museum, conservators clean and restore documents that have become creased, torn and soiled with two centuries of dirt.
Many of the documents are charred around the edges, evidence of the 1911 fire at the state capitol that destroyed or damaged a vast collection of books and documents dating back to New York's beginnings as a Dutch colony. A corner of one scrap that has been reduced to the shape of a pineapple bears the second half of Washington's signature. Other documents bear the signatures of John Hancock and James Monroe.
The journal kept during New York's 1788 ratification proceedings for the U.S. Constitution ends in signatures including those of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, George Clinton and Isaac Roosevelt, the great-great-grandfather of Franklin D. Roosevelt and a distant relative of Theodore Roosevelt.
"It's a who's who of early New York politics," said Andrew Arpey, an archivist with the state archives.
Papers connected to Arnold's treason include the passes he signed for Andre and a list of the defenses and troop strength around West Point that he supplied to the British spy.
Arnold switched sides after being passed over for promotion despite his battlefield successes, including having helped defeat the British at the Battles of Saratoga in 1777.
Andre was hanged as a spy soon after he was caught with the incriminating papers stuffed in his boot.
ALBANY, New York (AP) -- The major general was so well known that even his abbreviated signature -- "B. Arnold" -- was sufficient on a pass to ensure anyone safe passage.
But in September 1780 that signature sealed Benedict Arnold's fate, as the American hero of Saratoga became America's most infamous traitor.
The passes he scrawled for "John Anderson" -- the alias of John Andre, a British spy -- are among the most treasured items among the thousands of Revolutionary War documents and relics in the state library and archives in the New York State Museum.
Now, thanks to a nearly $164,000 matching grant from Save America's Treasures, a public-private partnership between the National Park Service and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the museum can work to preserve fragile artifacts. Those include the Arnold note and one of George Washington's dress swords.
With one-third of the Revolutionary War's battles fought in New York state, the archive is a major repository for historic materials from that era, according to officials involved in the preservation project.
"It speaks to the tremendous emotional connection New Yorkers feel to the Revolutionary War, much in the way Southerners connect to the Civil War," said Robert Bullock, director of the Archives Partnership Trust, a not-for-profit organization affiliated with the state archives.
In a large, well-lit lab in the museum, conservators clean and restore documents that have become creased, torn and soiled with two centuries of dirt.
Many of the documents are charred around the edges, evidence of the 1911 fire at the state capitol that destroyed or damaged a vast collection of books and documents dating back to New York's beginnings as a Dutch colony. A corner of one scrap that has been reduced to the shape of a pineapple bears the second half of Washington's signature. Other documents bear the signatures of John Hancock and James Monroe.
The journal kept during New York's 1788 ratification proceedings for the U.S. Constitution ends in signatures including those of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, George Clinton and Isaac Roosevelt, the great-great-grandfather of Franklin D. Roosevelt and a distant relative of Theodore Roosevelt.
"It's a who's who of early New York politics," said Andrew Arpey, an archivist with the state archives.
Papers connected to Arnold's treason include the passes he signed for Andre and a list of the defenses and troop strength around West Point that he supplied to the British spy.
Arnold switched sides after being passed over for promotion despite his battlefield successes, including having helped defeat the British at the Battles of Saratoga in 1777.
Andre was hanged as a spy soon after he was caught with the incriminating papers stuffed in his boot.