As mentioned on July 8th, several unsuccessful attempts in the removal of the wheels led us to plan B:  Disassemble the side plates by removal about 30 bolts… Fortunately, we have not had to remove every single bolt (yet), but by using Ridgid screw extractors we’ve made a great start! Removing only the bolts around the wheels released enough [...]

This is a nice shot by Jason from photography of the three recently conserved Dahlgren gun tools: a sponge on the left, a Robinson worm in the middle, and a shot ladle on the right. Handling the objects during the photo session reminded us of how fit the gunners had to be to do their [...]

Today was a major milestone in the effort to conserve USS Monitor’s amazing artifacts. Almost 147 years after the iconic ironclad sank, conservators rotated the port gun carriage to its original upright position. USS Monitor’s two custom-built gun carriages have been upside down since the ironclad sank on December 31, 1862. The gun carriages were [...]