Monday, August 16, 2010

Amdeep, came by the museum today to give a presentation to the DECR on the turtle study he has been working on for the last two years.

While he was setting up this afternoon he showed me several images of something that happened to him this spring.

In April he was out with a local fisherman catching and tagging turtles. They came across and began following a tiger shark in shallow water. Amdeep thought he saw a large hook in the fin, so they decided to catch it.

The tiger shark is a very aggressive and very dangerous type of shark. It is what you are suppose to stay away from. They followed the shark. Caught the shark by the tail. Roped the shark. Brought the shark up on the boat. And then took off what wound up being an ID Tag. The shark had been tagged in Bimini, Bahamas. The tag assumed that the shark had been caught and killed. But no, Amdeep actually caught it alive. They removed the tag and eventually sent it back to the organization that tagged it. After removing the tag, they stuck a turtle tag back in the fin and let the shark go.

Now that is crazy!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Tile Mosaics

By Davis Hitch


This week's Children's Club at the National Museum introduced mosaic art to the children of Grand Turk.




It started as a walk down to Sea Breeze, a small apartment building. We walked down from the museum - a long hot trip. Once we arrived at our destination we split into two groups: boys and girls. The girls entered fist to take a little tour of some small mosaics. Then the boys entered. We walked along listening to Dr. Neal Hitch, the museum director, give a speech about the different ways to make the tiled art work. Then we looked at some examples; walls with mosaics embedded into them, tables with pictures of fish swimming - even the chairs where colored with tiles.

After the tour we made the long hike back to the museum. Once again we split into three teams and sat with a counselor who was in charge of each table. We started by coloring sketches of what our teams mosaic would look like. We then edited some parts and took out some things that wouldn't work when we made the picture with broken tiles. By the time we finished the club had ended and we all went home looking forward to cutting the tile next week.




When at last the next Tuesday arrived, again we broke back into our groups and used pieces of tile we cut up or smashed to fill in our sketches. When our groups were done, we sent them to the museum director to lay out and set in mortor that had been put on concrete slabs. When they where set to dry we got a little snack and went home imagining what our art work would look like set up in the museum garden.

Monday, August 9, 2010

GIVING OLD PICTURES NEW LIFE



EARLY images of one of Grand Turk’s first formal medical facilities have been given a new lease of life thanks to an extremely patient design student.
Shalomar Forbes, an intern working at the National Museum, took it upon herself to revamp 14 old black and white photos.

And now her relentless hard work will be put to good use as the pictures will be pumped up and put on display at the new Cockburn Town Medical Centre.
Brian Hogan, NHIB’s chief executive officer, said it was an appropriate way to pay tribute to medical pioneers that laid the foundation of the modern medical system.
“NHIB is proud to work with the excellent group of medical professionals in the Ministry of Health, private practice and InterHealth Canada.

“We felt that incorporating a bit of TCI’s healthcare history was the best way to demonstrate our appreciation to healthcare professionals and remind people how TCI’s healthcare system has evolved.” Shalomar, who will be completing a degree in graphic design this year at Barry University in Miami, spent hours restoring 14 prints of the Grand Turk medical facility from the early 1960s. She scanned the historic images, which are part of the permanent collection at the National Museum, into her computer and cleaned them up using specialist software.

Shalomar said: “The original pictures were so small, about two inches square, and enlarging them proved very difficult.
“They are over 50-years-old and every small scratch or spot became huge once we scanned them in.” However her hard work was not in vain and the photos were enlarged more than five times their original size. The images show the Grand Turk hospital, nurse Bailey, and images of the probationary nurses’ class which were all photographed by Allan Bishop in the early 1960s.

National Museum director Neal Hitch said: “Medical facilities were at a minimum in the Turks and Caicos during 1960s with a 16 bed hospital on Grand Turk, a small operating theatre, an x-ray machine with limited capacity and a rudimentary laboratory. “Medical staff included two medical officers, one on Grand Turk and one in South Caicos. “The staff at the Grand Turk hospital consisted of a matron, four staff nurses, three probationary nurses, and one nurse working as a midwife.”
He went on to say that during 1960 eight women from the Caicos Islands were recruited and trained in Grand Turk to be midwives.

They were considered settlement nurses and were provided with a nurse's bag, dressing, scissors, and a stretcher on which to evacuate very ill patients.
Prior to this, many local settlements were without any trained medical help.
By 1967 the Grand Turk hospital was aided by four medical clinics in the islands, in Grand Turk, Salt Cay, South Caicos, and Bottle Creek, North Caicos.
Much changed by 1970 when medical staff included two doctors, one dentist, one matron, seven staff nurses, nine settlement nurses, nine probationary nurses, and two public health inspectors.

NHIB’s Mr Hogan said they showed current staff members the historic prints before they were taken for framing, and one recognised a family member.
“We hope that persons visiting our offices will take time out to look at the amazing prints; who knows, you might see yourself, a family member or a friend.”

If anyone can identify the nurses in the photograph that accompanies this article they can contact the National Museum at info@tcmuseum.org

Also, anyone who owns black and white prints showcasing the health sector, hospitality or utility sector is encouraged to contact the museum.