Living in the arid deserts of Ancient Egypt, a 10-year-old King Tutankhamun wasn't worried about his face paint smearing or his hair frizzing from humidity.

More than 3,000 years later, in the swampy heat that gripped Chicago last week, the young king was u renovation which brought plant operations into a 30,000 square foot facility at the museum.

The cooling system was installed in 2002 as part of a $23 million renovation that brought central plant operations into a 30,000 square foot facility at the museum...

Tut's caretakers require the exhibit to maintain a temperature between 68 and 70 degrees with 45 percent to 50 percent humidity, 24 hours a day. These ranges ensure the resin-soaked linen bandages covering Tut's salt-and baking-soda-treated leathery skin don't crack from climate-related expansion and contraction...

How Tut beats the heat at the Field, Esther J. Cepeda, Chicago Sun-Times, Illinois, USA, July 27, 2006.

Botanists Ahmed Fahmy and Rim Hamdy were out earlier this month to inspect the garlands and floral collars from Coffin ‘E’, with plans to return again next season. A few of our larger ‘treasures’ were transferred to the Luxor SCA magazine for storage, as they have been registered.

Following the installation of an iron gate covering the KV-63 entrance and the clearance of the far corner of the chamber floor (to make sure there were no hidden mummies or tunnels), packing of equipment and securing the crated coffins inside KV-10, both tombs were closed and padlocked on Sunday, July 9th.

After a few days of packing up I was on my way to Cairo via train (yes, via train) for a few days of meetings and paperwork before heading home to Chicago at the end of the month.

I will be bringing with me the long awaited images of Coffin E floral collars and much, much, more to pass on to our Webmaster, Bill Wilson.

Signing off...

Director Otto Schaden

There is also a short note from Bill and Roxanne Wilson.

KV63: Otto's Dig Diary, Dr. Otto Schaden, Amenmesse Project, University of Memphis, Tennessee, July 25, 2006.

A nicely painted but none-too-fancy 2,200-year-old Egyptian coffin that stirred up a hornet's nest of trouble late in May has joined the Field Museum's permanent exhibits on daily life in Egypt in the time of the pharaohs.

The coffin, on extended loan from Exelon Corp.'s chief executive, John Rowe, appeared in the museum's permanent Egyptian gallery Friday. Probably made by provincial artisans for a middle-class person of some means, the coffin, according to one Egyptian authority, is "colourful, whimsical and charming," but the sort of object museums usually don't provide space for public exhibition.

An avid history buff, Rowe bought the beautifully preserved empty wood coffin about 10 years ago from a Chicago dealer to display it in a glass case in his office at Exelon headquarters. He reluctantly gave it up last May 25, a day after Zahi Hawass, secretary general of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, publicly castigated Rowe for owning such an object...

A home all can live with, William Mullen, The Chicago Tribune, Illinois, USA, July 25, 2006.