Got Spores? Portrait of the Curator as Darth Vader Redux

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • May 11, 2015

Maybe a year or so ago I posted a similar image of myself while cleaning the Special Collection books. Bet you didn’t know I tend to wear a mask and goggles more often and in the Mitchell House to boot. This is my “Mitchell House rite of spring.” Cleaning mildew off the ceiling in the front sitting room and on occasion – such as this year – the sitting room.


I am bundled up because even though it was April 28th, it was about 45F in the Mitchell House. I wear a mask and goggles for two reasons. 1. I should not be breathing in the rubbing alcohol, and, 2. I should not be breathing in any spores. (Is my life GLAMOROUS or what?!) I use three parts water to one part rubbing alcohol. This not only kills the spores on the top but below the surface as well. Bleach just gets the spores on the top and then opens the lower ones, allowing the spores to continue to grow.


So, my first thing in Mitchell House is always this task as for the winter all the furniture is covered with sheets and plastic and gathered in the middle of the room allowing easy movement and protecting the historic artifacts.


JNLF

Recent Posts

The Evil Four Inches

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • May 5, 2025
I have posted this during Women’s History Month before but because it is March and Women’s History Month, I think it’s worth repeating. It’s clever and helps to tell an important story in women’s history while giving it a bit of a 21 st century twist. It comes via the National Women’s History Project .  JNLF

Keep Calm and Bird On: May 2025

May 1, 2025
“If you don’t look, you don’t see. You have to go and look.” -Edith Andrews

Maria Mitchell In Her Own Words

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • April 28, 2025
Lynn, Ap. 25 1869  My dear President, I am not sure I told you how long I must be away from the College. If I took only the Sunday’s rest, it would be possible for me to reach the Obs. By Tuesday, but I feel the need of more than one day of quiet, before I enter upon the new and incomprehensible life before me . . . William Mitchell died on April 19, 1869 and for the first time, Maria Mitchell was alone. Save for her trip to the southern United States and Europe in 1857 and 1858, her father was always by her side. She did not know much of a day in her life without him nearby and she knows that. It was difficult for her – and her siblings worried about her and this new world she was now in. She had been – expect for that trip – the caregiver for both of her parents. Her mother, Lydia Coleman Mitchell, died in 1861 on Nantucket and Maria had cared for her as well. She was the child who became the caregiver of the family – both in her youth as her siblings sought her out for care, humor, love, and adventures while their mother was busy with younger children and household duties – and then her parents as the only child who did not marry and remained by their sides. JNLF
Show More