Small town networking and deep local roots linked world traveler Tim Carroll to the Grand Traverse Heritage Center.
The Peninsula Township native retired back to his ancestral home in 2002 after a career as a diplomat in service of various government agencies. When Carroll and his sisters recently delved into a family trunk, they found a treasure trove of vintage clothes worn by their ancestors. Thanks to Jeanne Snow of the Grand Traverse Regional Community Foundation, Carroll connected with Nancy Bordine, a vintage clothing collector and member of the Grand Traverse Heritage Center board and the center's acquisitions committee.
After tea last Thursday at his home, Carroll turned the spring afternoon into Christmas morning for Bordine as he revealed piece after piece from the trunk. Also attending the tea were Heritage Center board member Peg Jonkhoff, Sheryl Hayward, executive director of the City Opera House, and Bill Cole of the Peter Dougherty Society.
"My sister, Michele Carroll Hicks, had lived in my grandmother Wilhelm's house, which was next door to my great grandfather's house,” said Carroll. "So in 1974 when my great grandmother's and great grandfather's house was sold, she took all these things and put them in her outbuilding. I hadn't seen the trunk since we moved it in the 1970s.”
The collection includes clothing dating from the 1800s through the middle of the last century, with the majority shading to the earlier era. Bordine is inventorying and evaluating the pieces and will write up a proposal for donation to the Grand Traverse Heritage Center. Carroll would like it termed the Norma Wilhelm Carroll Collection in honor of his mother.
"We feel that [the Grand Traverse Heritage Center] is the ideal place for it to reside,” Carroll said.
Pieces range from men's suits, women's hats and an infant's Christening dress to women's underclothes, a young ladies coat, chemises and skirts. A mourning dress plus a wedding dress and a traveling dress are some of the showpieces of the find. In 1884, Mary Pomazel Wilhelm wore the wedding and traveling dresses, the quality construction and many layers are a testament to the style and quality of the pieces that characterized an era.
"This truly was a treasure chest and the dresses are just exquisite,” said Bordine, an R.N. at Munson Medical Center. "Each one of them as he pulled them out, oh my gosh, they were just so sweet.”
Carroll and his sisters' roots extend into the earliest days of European settlement in the Grand Traverse region, making the handed down clothing all the more relevant. All eight great grandparents lived in Traverse City during the 1850s: the Johnsons, the Carrolls, the Wilhelms and the Smolars.
"They are precious not only because they are exquisite gowns but because they are so relevant to Traverse City's history,” Bordine added of the clothing.
The City Opera House and the Grand Traverse Heritage Center are discussing a possible joint venture next year for the annual spring fashion show. After last month's 12th annual event packed them in at the Grand Traverse Heritage Center, a larger venue such as the City Opera House might be just the ticket.
"It would be very nice to work together with the Opera House because the Wilhelm family helped build that and this is their story, their history,” said Bordine, who envisions building a show around the Norma Wilhelm Carroll collection. "What [this collection] will do for the museum is provide such a fabulous base for the 2008 show and we will borrow from the community as many other things as we can from the original settlers of Traverse City and really try and do an original settlers theme.”