The recent publicity for the ASEAN Museum Directors Symposium reminded me of a book I read. The symposium presumably is a formal discussion of museum work and the future of museums from the Director’s perspective but how do the other people in the museum view it?

Museum: Behind the scenes of the Metropolitan Museum of Art by Danny Danziger presents this famous museum through stories of the people who work there: curators, cleaners, volunteers, florists etc.

Through a somewhat unconventional approach, the many stories give us a sense of the huge efforts that are required to maintain a Museum. It also gives us insight into the lives of the people we often take for granted eg. security, sales staff and makes us aware that they are human too! It is heartwarming to note that a common thread of the stories is their shared enthusiasm for their jobs and the Museum.

Click here for a detailed review.

Another book I have been reading is Mamoru Shinozaki’s My wartime experiences in Singapore published as part of the ISEAS Oral History Programme Series in 1973.

This book is actually a transcript of an oral history recording conducted by ISEAS (Institute of Southeast Asian Studies). Mamoru Shinozaki was Press Attache of the Japanese consulate prior to the war, and was interned at Changi Prison for being a spy. He was scheduled to be executed but was saved by the Japanese invasion on the day of his execution. After the Japanese captured Singapore, Shinozaki worked for the military administration in various positions: Advisor of Defence Headquarters, Chief Officer of Education and Chief Welfare Officer. From the interview, it would seem that he was always sympathetic to the locals and tried his best to improve their welfare during that time.

This is one of the few English publications that shed light on the occupation from a Japanese perspective (albeit one very sympathetic to Europeans and locals) and I found it very interesting. It seems that he has written a memoir, Syonan — My Story, on his experiences. You can find out more about him at this wikipedia site.

I’ve never liked war history much and especially the period of the Japanese Occupation in Singapore. However, I been recently intrigued by memoirs written during the period. A memoir I have been reading is E.J.H. Corner’s The Marquis: A tale of Synonan-To, published in Singapore by Heinemann Asia in 1981.

Written by the former Assistant Director of the Gardens Department from 1929-1945, this book is a memoir of Corner’s life during the Japanese Occupation. He had escaped internment by a letter from Shenton Thomas (Governor at the time) requesting the Japanese authorities to preserve the scientific collection, libraries, Museum and Botanic Gardens. Corner was then asked to help in the task. He first worked under “The Professor” – Prof Hidezo Tanakadate, vulcanologist and geologist of Tohoku Imperial University of Sendai. The highlight of the book is Corner’s recollections of “The Marquis” – Marquis Yoshichika Tokugawa, who was the President of the Museum and Botanical Gardens when Singapore was Syonan-To.

It was both an exciting and interesting read. It was exciting as Corner’s life at that time was hanging by a thread. There were numerous “near-misses” where he could have been killed or interned but by some stroke of luck managed to escape. It was also very interesting to me as a former Museum employee as it gave me greater insight on the precarious fate of the collections at that time, and how close rare documents came to being pieces of paper used to wrap up vegetables in a wet market.

An interesting incident concerns a former Director of the Museum, Carl Gibson-Hill who initially escaped internment.  In a section titled “Ill manners”, Corner suggests that it was Gibson-Hill’s poor manners that got him arrested. In pp. 51-52 he described a meeting between The Professor and Gibson-Hill:

We entered the workshop at the back where Gibson-Hill, unaware perhaps of Tokyo time, was concluding his breakfast. He was seated barefoot in an old chair, one leg sprawling over an arm of the chair, one hand flourishing a very long cigarette-holder with an lighted cigarette, and in an open-necked shirt, displaying a tangled ginger beard. He did not get up. The Professor did not smoke and, as I discovered later, disliked, as many Japanese, what he called red hair. The professor’s dismay flared into anger. He pulled a revolver from his pocked, waved it at the astonished Gibson-Hill who began to laugh, and said “Stand up! I have shot Chinese for less than this.” He had picked up the revolver in the Gardens the day before and I had ascertained that it was not loaded. We continued with our inspection, but the Professor was troubled. He decided that Gibson-Hill must be interned. “No Japanese can like him.”

People have indeed died for less/more than that.

“It wasn’t only Hitler who had a bunker” was the enticing title to the book review of the latest offering by military historian Richard Holmes. Titled Churchill’s Bunker: The Secret Headquarters at the Heart of Britain’s Victory traces the role of the war office which was underneath Whitehall, quite literally.

The Cabinet War Rooms, as the bunker was known, has now been turned into a museum dedicated to those years – Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms.

Here’s a recent review of Samsui Girl by Dr Carmelita C Ballesteros.

Note: Stephanie worked as a museum educator not a curator as in the original article.