A museum to tell the story of St. Martin

Hello from St. Martin! 

Although Amuseum Naturalis has been closed to visitors due to lockdown, we have been busier than ever during recent months. We have been working to provide Amuseum experiences at home and preparing new ways to deliver local nature and heritage education.

Launched in March, Amuseum@Home is an online program that has shared over 100 books, videos and activities about local nature and heritage. All of it is free. 

We have also launched a program called Heritage Backup. We are working with the community to document and preserve local history and heritage. We are especially focused on personal and family histories that are not part of the usual historical narratives about the powerful and wealthy, but instead share the history and heritage of everyday people. We are collecting memories, images and stories daily.

We have also been adapting our museum exhibits into book form. We have been sharing the books online for free, but with funding we can also print copies of them to distribute to schools. We believe this can be a valuable resource that isn’t dependent on access to the physical Amuseum or an internet-connected device.

We are also preparing the Amuseum for reopening when we can do it safely. We hope this is soon. 

Thank you for your support! Please take some time to check out Amuseum@Home, Heritage Backup and some of our new books. If you have or know people with kids, the Amuseum@Home activities are fun no matter where you live!

If you are able to support the Amuseum, we can really use the help right now. Any contributions are greatly appreciated.

Stay safe and thank you!!!

Links:

• Amuseum@Home
• Heritage Backup
• Free digital books.

It is hard to believe that just two short years ago, we began clearing fallen trees and debris from the abandoned and hurricane-ravaged Old House on St. Martin.

The Amuseum today is a beautiful place. It offers rich experiences. Nature and heritage come alive in sights, sounds and stories. Visitors travel through time and space: St. Martin of different eras, and unique places on the island that few have visited.

We recently donated a set of 24 full-size museum panels on lightweight material to one of the schools near us, where they will rotate through classrooms where the walls have been bare for the last two years. We also continue to add exhibits at the Amuseum, most recently about bush medicine, salt production as told by someone who did that work over sixty years ago, and the Moho stone, an Arawak petroglyph located nearby.

Thanks again for your support! We literally could not have done this without you.

We are currently applying for funding to continue our work at the Amuseum. We would be deeply grateful for additional support if you are able to help. We are fundraising to make sure we can contribute the 20% of funds required by some grants, and also to cover expenses not included in project funding, but critical to operating and improving St. Martin’s best free museum.

Links:

• St. Martin Image Collection