Grand Canyon Restored Area 1600X800
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Lindsey Buscher was filling up her water bottle in Science Hall when she realized that the Grand Canyon relief model on the wall next to the drinking fountain had appeared at the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. 

"This just so happened to be mentioned in a Volume 5 entry I had been working on that day about cartography in the public sphere," said Buscher, who is senior research editor on the History of Cartography Project, a multi-volume reference work that examines the history of maps across cultures, from prehistoric origins to the twentieth century. "I knew it would be important to have a photo of this beautiful artifact in the book."

Buscher and her fellow editors initiated the idea to restore the relief map, which had been bumped, scraped and cracked over the decades, to its original grandeur. In the summer of 2019, an ambitious effort to clean, stabilize, and repair the model, using state-of-the-art materials and conservation techniques, was launched on the second floor of Science Hall.

Closeup of a portion of the model before conservation, showing cracks, chipping and discoloration (photo by Lindsey Buscher)

The Grand Canyon relief model is Science Hall’s oldest model. In fact, it is older than Science Hall itself. According to Melanie Schleeter McCalmont’s book “A Wilderness of Rocks: The Impact of Relief Models on Data Science,” the model is the oldest commercial relief map in the United States. It was created by Edwin Howell in 1875 based on information available at the time, including John Wesley Powell’s Grand Canyon expeditions. 

As McCalmont’s book documents, there are many other relief models from this era on display at locations around the state including Science Hall, the UW-Madison Geology Museum, UW-Whitewater, and UW-Milwaukee. The Grand Canyon relief model was most likely left in Science Hall in about 1980, when the Geology Museum moved out of the building.  

A photograph of the relief model will appear in an entry and on the cover of Volume 5 of the History of Cartography Project. The conservation of the model was funded by the UW-Madison Geography Department and a donation from Rosalind Woodward, wife of the late David Woodward who co-founded the History of Cartography Project and served as its editor until his death in 2004.

Complicating the History of Cartography’s plan to use a photo of the model for Volume 5 was the condition of the model itself. Nearly one hundred and fifty years of exposure to the environment had taken a toll. The model was covered in dust, the plaster had several good-sized cracks in it, and the paint was chipped and flaking in many spots. Paint discoloration was also evident from exposure to sunlight over the decades.

“Eventually it was decided that the damage was too extensive to be able to use a good enough photo of it in its current state, so we teamed up with the Geography Department and the State Cartographer’s Office to hire a professional conservator,” said Buscher.

Conservation was done by Craig Deller, who is the materials conservator at the Wisconsin Historical Society and Senior Conservator of the Deller Conservation Group in Madison. Deller was trained at the Smithsonian Institution’s Conservation Analytical Laboratory and was elected a Fellow of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works in 2015.

Deller at work on the relief model (photo by Lindsey Buscher)

Deller was assisted by Sarah Stankey, who completed her Master of Fine Arts degree at UW-Madison in 2019 and now works as a preparator/photographer at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art. She performed the tedious and delicate work of painting the areas that had been stabilized and filled in where the more extensive damage had occurred. Stankey also took photos of the progress throughout the process as well as the finished product. 

The conservation approach adopted for the Grand Canyon relief model included:

  • Scanning with a metal detector to determine whether a woven metal substrate exists (negative)
  • Cleaning the model and frame with aqueous-based artificial saliva
  • Solvent testing with acetone (negative), ethanol (positive), and mineral spirits (negative)
  • Stabilization of edges of paint loss and bare plaster areas with a finely dispersed, aqueous dispersion of an acrylic copolymer
  • Filling areas of plaster loss with a cellulose-based fill material
  • Sealing of the entire surface with a solution of B-72, an acrylic resin soluble in acetone, ethanol, and xylene
  • In-painting using Maimeri Restoration Colors and Gamblin Conservation Colors

There were large areas of previous over-paint that were left in place, along with numerous previous touch-ups presumably made when the model was updated over the years.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the conservation lies in the fact that the in-painting was done on top of the B-72 sealant. The in-painting can be removed using mineral spirits without affecting the sealant coat, and the sealant coat can be removed using acetone, which does not interact with the finish of the original relief model. This approach means that the repairs made to the model are non-destructive and can be removed.

The treatment report for the relief model can be found here for readers who want more detail on the techniques used.

Please contact Howard Veregin, State Cartographer, at veregin@wisc.edu or the History of Cartography Project (Lindsey Buscher, lbuscher@wisc.edu) if you have questions.

Rosalind Woodward, whose gift helped make the conservation of the Grand Canyon relief map possible (photo by Lindsey Buscher)