Of all days in 2016 to showcase a “shrunken head,” Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science & Art officials in Scranton, Pennsylvania, chose Halloween. Despite acknowledging “ethical considerations,” museum staff highlighted the dried body part like a grisly relic starring as a grotesque creature in a low budget horror movie.
Museum officials posted a bizarre slide show on Facebook that shows what appears to be a tiny human head, shrunken and tanned by boiling, its mouth agape as long wavy dark hair swings in a grim sideshow display the museum previously presented to the public.
The following Facebook narrative accompanies the museum’s tasteless production:
“Many Lackawanna County residents have fond memories of being frightened and fascinated by the Everhart’s shrunken head. This somewhat gruesome artifact was removed from view several years ago. Displaying human remains is inappropriate and presents ethical considerations for museums. The curatorial staff has been looking to authenticate this piece to determine if it was a true Tsantsa (religious artifact) or an object made to satisfy the tourist trade by the indigenous Shuar people of Peru and Ecuador.”
Fond memories?
Somewhat gruesome artifact?
The museum’s misguided narrative continues:
“Thanks to the Mütter Museum of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia, the Everhart was able to take samples of hair and skin tissue for analysis by the Arcadia University Forensic Science Program. A few other museums are also participating in the study, and we hope to have more information after the tests are completed next year.
The photos attached here are of the harvesting of the hair and skin samples. We are excited to share this news with our community and promise updates as we receive them!”
Nine years later nobody officially connected with the Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science & Art is sharing news with the community about their ghastly pilfered prize. And the Mütter Museum has its own ongoing problems revolving around storing human body parts.
Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science & Art CEO Timothy Lennon Holmes failed to respond to numerous shrunken head questions I sent him in a recent email. Museum curator James Lansing also failed to respond to an email. So did museum Board of Trustees Chair Caroline Munley Esq. and former chair Donald Frederickson Esq. who also serves as Lackawanna County Solicitor.
What kind of human ghouls degrade sacred remains of a corpse possibly robbed from a grave or bartered in exchange for money in such an offhand and careless manner? Cruel white colonialists historically treated Indigenous people with vicious bigotry. By refusing to answer legitimate questions Everhart Museum officials continue to insult vibrant native humanity.
Like the Everhart’s 2,000-year-old Peruvian mummy whose human remains museum officials failed to repatriate to Peru and keep in storage to this day, was the Everhart shrunken head once part of a spirited teenage boy? A proud adult male warrior? A bright courageous woman? An innocent child?
Countless people in the Scranton area and elsewhere remember seeing shrunken heads featured at the Everhart Museum. A friend contacted me after I wrote about the mummy.
“I remember seeing that mummy several times, as well as the shrunken head,” my friend said.
Another friend now in his sixties remembers seeing two shrunken heads on display at the Everhart Museum when he and his brother gawked at the macabre exhibit as wide-eyed children.
“There’s two shrunken heads in the collection that were bartered from the Shuar tribe,” he said.
Did the museum scientifically authenticate the shrunken head or heads? And, if the head is human, did museum officials return the remains or otherwise respectfully turn them over to caring authorities in Peru or Ecuador where this person or persons once lived? As Everhart officials still warehouse the mummy, do these esteemed civic leaders continue to disrespect life with the same cavalier reckless abandon immature 1950s teenagers showed when they dangled rubber shrunken heads from the rear view mirrors of their cars?
This cringeworthy chapter of Scranton history isn’t just another crackpot episode of The Office that draws fawning fans to the parochial city that served as the setting for the silly NBC television comedy.
No, the scandalous secrets of Scranton’s Everhart Museum of Natural History, Science & Art are savagely and shamefully real.