SAN ANGELO, Texas — The Fort Concho Museum wants to continue to document the history of Tom Green County and surrounding areas. Museums such as the fort have been hit hard by the pandemic. However, that is not stopping them from pressing forward and continuing to preserve the history of the Concho Valley and the surrounding areas.
Fort Concho is seizing the opportunity to renew and update its collections. Back in 2019, the museum started a grant to create a road map to decide how they want to update the museum site. The multipage document talks about what fort staff wants to do with the archives and exhibit updates and enhancements.
Cory Robinson, Fort Concho Museum curator, said preserving the history helps future generations to know about it.
"People here in Tom Green County and San Angelo and the immediate area can know their history and background. But Fort Concho, but Fort Concho provides educational opportunities for people from all over the country," Robinson said.
He said the cost is one of the biggest challenges for this project at this time, with each project having a separate budget. Right now, the budget is estimated to be $10,000-$20,000 for each exhibit revamp.
Some of the new additions to the museum the fort is looking into are display cases, interpretive panels, and high-tech and upgraded interactives, to name a few.
Museum staff said they would be able to hit one of their main priorities: to diversify the museum. Being able to bring out more historical objects will allow them to do so.
"African Americans on the frontier, African Americans within the military at the time period. What were women's roles at the time period? Telling the stories of the Native Americans of the region...Let's talk about all of the history and culture," Robinson said.
In addition to writing extra grants and getting money from the public, finding the space is another critical factor in this project to house the different elements for these future exhibits.
Laura Huckaby, San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts assistant director and collections manager, said SAMFA is working on joint storage space with Fort Concho.
"What we really want to do is we want to increase the visibility and the availability of our collections while making this a true archival storage space," Huckaby said.
The Fort Concho Museum staff said this project would be complete within the next 5-10 years.