Maria Cunningham loves doing detective work.
The Milwaukee librarian and artist founded The Whatnot Museum, a collection of historical and cultural curiosities that includes medical models, art, toys, advertisements and other items.
“I like to focus on the smaller things that people don’t necessarily think about but are important to our culture and are great pieces of evidence in our culture,” Cunningham said.
Some of the collection’s historical Black hair and beauty products were displayed in an exhibit at the Milwaukee Public Library Atkinson Branch, 1960 W. Atkinson Ave., in February.
“There’s just a subset of things I call ‘whatnot’ because it doesn’t really fit into anything else,” Cunningham said of the museum’s namesake.
A collector’s journey
Since growing up on the North Side of Milwaukee as the youngest of seven children in her family, Cunningham loved collecting things and creating art.
She attended Nicolet High School in Glendale and carried her love of art into college at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
There, Cunningham earned a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, specializing in ceramics, and a master’s degree in library and information science. She also received a certificate in museum studies and worked at the Milwaukee Public Library before moving to Portland, Oregon.
Two years ago, she returned to Milwaukee’s Sherman Park/Uptown area to be closer to family. Cunningham works full-time as a librarian.
Cunningham dreamed of starting a museum as she casually collected items she found historically interesting or that visually informed her toy-inspired artwork. She didn’t think it would happen before she retired until a friend with an art collection gave her a nudge.
“She was like, ‘Why don’t you just do it?’” Cunningham said. “‘Like, why does it have to be something you put off? You have all this stuff.’”
Her older sister, Kim Cunningham, said Maria has intentionally built her collection over the last five or six years.
“She puts so much hard work into the research and acquiring of the pieces and finding things that are historically accurate,” Kim Cunningham said.
Cunningham’s family likes to tease her about the objects being haunted, she said, but they give her advice on the condition, familiarity or context of things she is adding to the collection.
Building her collection
The Whatnot Museum’s collection includes medical models and products, toys and games, and paintings, sculptures and textiles.
It also includes pieces tied to Black history and culture, mourning and funeral traditions, and bones and taxidermy specimens.
There’s also printed matter and ephemera, which cover materials that were made but not meant to be saved, like bus passes and product labels.
The collection includes everything from poison labels from Milwaukee druggists to glass eyes, engraved love tokens and dime store toys.
Cunningham also collects Victorian-era hairwork pieces, which are jewelry or small objects made with human hair to remember a loved one or symbolize a friendship or bond.
“There’s just a lot of beauty in these things that stay behind after we’re gone,” Cunningham said.
The hairwork spider is particularly creepy, her sister said.
Kim Cunningham says she jokes with her sister about the human hair items she’s collected.
“‘Is it from the 1900s and part of the Spanish flu outbreak? Could it be releasing like old antiquated diseases on society?,’” Kim Cunningham asked.
Other materials explore past perceptions of sex and erotica, like tart cards – advertisements for sex workers that were commonly displayed in telephone boxes in England in the 1980s-2000s.
“You wouldn’t really see those in a museum because people might not think it is family friendly, but it tells a lot about a certain subset or subsection of our society,” Cunningham said.
Roots of Black hair care
Cunningham said she mentioned her research on old Black beauty products to the manager of the Milwaukee Public Library’s Atkinson Branch, who thought it would be a good idea for a Black History Month program.
The exhibit, “Crowning Glory: The Roots of the Black Hair Industry,” featured displays of packaging of Black hair care products made between 1920 and 1960, some with the product still in them, along with advertisement reproductions and profiles of leaders in the industry.
“I want people to see that there is a history of Black invention in the haircare industry that we don’t really know about,” Cunningham said.
She seeks out historical objects that accurately depict Black people, like mourning brooches or a trading card from a Howard University football game.
Next steps
Cunningham used to volunteer at America’s Black Holocaust Museum, which inspired her to start building The Whatnot Museum online.
She hopes to expand the online exhibits this year and share her research through more public and educational programs.
“I think the goal was for her to get her name out there, get the museum name out there more so people know the collection’s available, especially for research,” her sister said.
Cunningham recently found a physical space for the museum at 2455 S. Howell Ave., Suite 3, which will be open soon by appointment. This location will help her achieve her goals of having an office to process larger items and creating a public viewing space.
“I want it to be like a space that’s laid back and (you can) actually, like, discover things and have experiences with the objects and items instead of, ‘oh, there’s this thing behind glass,’” she said.
Meredith Melland is the neighborhoods reporter for the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and a corps member of Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. Report for America plays no role in editorial decisions in the NNS newsroom.
Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.
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