Times of the Islands Winter 2016/17

astrolabe
newsletter of the Turks & Caicos National Museum
front street, p.o. box 188, grand turk, turks & caicos islands, bwi
tel 649 946 2160 • fax 649 946 2160 • email info@tcmuseum.org • web www.tcmuseum.org
On the Road
Story & Photos By Dr. Donald H. Keith, President,
Turks & Caicos National Museum Foundation
66 www.timespub.tc
The road goes ever on and on down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the road has gone, and I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet, until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet, and whither then? I cannot say.
—J.R.R. Tolkien
This Volkswagen van was an integral part of the author’s journey
across the United States in 1973; he likens it to the journey of the
National Museum over the last 25 years.
In 1973 a friend and I set out on an epic journey. Our rather vague destination was Fairbanks, Alaska, which we
calculated to be 4,400 miles from our starting point in Chapel Hill, North Carolina—almost exactly the distance
from Grand Turk to Paris! Our conveyance was a Volkswagen transporter boasting 67 hp. It took weeks. The
actual round-trip distance ended up being 12,000 miles because we picked up Kor Smit, a Dutch hitchhiker,
near Devil’s Tower, Wyoming. Kor inspired us to relax the itinerary, to be more adventurous, and to take time
to meet people along the way. A friendly park ranger got us jobs painting the stripe down the center of the
“Going to the Sun” highway in Glacier National Park. That windfall extended our trip by several weeks. When
we finally made it to Fairbanks, it was kind of a let-down. The memorable part was the journey, the people we
met, the things we saw and did along the way, not the destination!
With the Museum’s 25th anniversary coming up in November it occurred to me that the TCNM is on a journey.
Not the kind you can measure in miles, but one that started out like our trip to Alaska with only a vague
destination and little knowledge of how to get there. Now, a quarter-century later it is still on the road—but
where is it headed?
The ultimate destination the directors see for the Museum is its secure, continued existence. That’s a tall
order and a huge responsibility for a handful of people to take on by themselves. National museums the world
over are supported by the citizens and governments of the nations they represent. But the TCNM was created
as a non-profit, non-governmental entity, entirely funded by its philanthropic founder, Mrs. Grethe Seim, so
it depends on public support. Yes, national museums can attract visitors, but governments have more compelling
reasons to support them: They constitute the collective memories and achievements of everyone who
ever lived there and as such preserve their nations’ histories and identities. Indeed, they define the nation.
For more than half my life my journey has been intertwined with that of the TCNM, its ups and downs, its
tenuous existence. The following article is a much abbreviated reflection on the Museum’s journey over the
last quarter century. a