This thesis is a study of the origins and rationale of two categories of house
museum - here named "Great Man" and "Social History" - in the United States
and Australia. An examination of cultural, social and historical change provides
the context for the genres' evolution.
The Great Man genre was born in mid nineteenth-century America when two
houses associated with George Washington - Hasbrouck House and Mount
Vernon - were preserved and translated to museum status. Mount Vernon quickly
became the exemplar for house museums.
Civil religion, a secular nationalism that adopted the forms and rituals of church
religion, focusing on hero worship, pilgrimage and contemplation of transcendent
collective purpose, provided the ideology that sustained the new museum type.
Great Man house museums became the shrines at which such rituals could be
practiced.
In the early twentieth-century the specialization of heritage organizations
encouraged a new breed of heritage professional. Largely fabric focused, these
"new museum men" influenced philosophy, management and conservation
practice at house museums throughout the century.
Social history made its impact upon house museums in the latter decades of the
twentieth century. The paradigm encouraged the creation of a new category of
house museum. Existing Great Man house museums adopted some of its
characteristics though never lost their hero worship foundations. In fact, I posit
that the idea of hero worship was transferred to the new genre.
The birth and evolution of the two categories of house museum is demonstrated
through four biographical studies: Vaucluse House in Sydney; Monticello in
Charlottesville VA; the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in New York City;
and Susannah Place Museum in Sydney. I believe the findings demonstrate an
argument that applies at hundreds of house museums in the United States and
Australia.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/218637 |
| Date | January 2002 |
| Creators | Smith, Charlotte H.F., n/a |
| Publisher | University of Canberra. Resource, Environment & Heritage Sciences |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | ), Copyright Charlotte H.F. Smith |
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