Greetinngs,

This morning a colleague sent me Mark Henderson's Histarch message concerning
adaptive reuse of surplus military bunkers for collections management. I
attempted and failed to send a response because I have not bee on Histarch in
about 3 years. I am now back on Histarch and have something to contribute to
this discussion. The following is my message from this morning:

Henderson of Ely, Nevada recently wrote of a wonderful opportunity to
house thousands of cubic feet of collections in surplus military bunkers, but
noted there is a "conceptual obstacle" in the minds of some government
archaeologists. I would like to respond that this is a VERY achievable
solution to the thousands of boxes of flaked stone, ground stone, and other
bulk samples.

Back in 1993, when Congress authorized Legacy Program funds for historic
preservation, I advised Captain Paul Ward, Commanding Officer, U.S. Naval
Submarine Base and his environmental officer to seek $250,000 to convert
several ammunition magazines to 36 CFR 79.9 collections management. Captain
Ward listened to my observations of similar magazines at Warren Air Force
Base, Cheyenne, Wyoming and authorized application for the funding.
Opposition from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers torpedoed my plan, but
Captain Ward found Navy environmental funding and we developed a scaled down
version that now houses 400 boxes of collections. I offer Histarch to
consider this as a pilot program for what archaeologists could do across the
nation to solve
collections housing problems.

Captain Ward assigned a 40-foot by 10-foot igloo bunker to the Fort Guijarros
Museum Foundation, Inc. and the Environmental Officer obtained $130,000.00.
Plans obtainted from the Santa Barbara County Museum of Natural History (for
converting a basement to 36 CFR 79.9 standards) were used by Navy Public
Works Center to convert the 1942 U.S. Army Hospital Morgue Annex to the
"Ballast Point Repository." This underground room houses mechanical HVAC
equipment, has a new concrete deck, is coated with 2-ply epoxy paint, and has
hygrothermographs that are monitored three times a week. The entire
collection is inspected each week by my staff.

In February 1999, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers inspected the Ballast
Point Repository. They reluctantly reported to Commander James Condon,
Executive Officer, Naval Base Point Loma, the collections management
operation was "pretty good."

Based on this pilot program, Histarch members could seek and find larger
magazines to be converted to house thousands of boxes of archaeological
collections. The organic materials, field notes and photographs can be housed
in subcontainers inside the magazines with HVAC controls. What a deal!!!

Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.