Defining Museums Continued....

In previous posts, I discussed some museums I've visited that are redefining the traditional interpretation of the word "museum." Museums are now breaking outside the walls of buildings and sometimes the museum is the walls of the building. In my post about Dinosaur Ridge, I wrote about the outdoor self-guided tour I took where the fossils were not displayed in glass cases but rather embedded in the side of a mountain. In my last post, I discussed The Lower East Side Tenement Museum, an old tenement that doesn't have historical artifacts in a building but instead the building itself is the artifact.

Another "alternative museum" I'd like to discuss is the Hiwan Homestead Museum which I visited on my trip to Colorado. Similar to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum the Hiwan Homestead Museum is about the building itself. Its a series of log homes that were once inhabited by different families and now have been opened to the public as a museum. It was also built in the late 1800s like the Tenement Museum but the similarities end there.

In 1893, Hiwan began as a simple, one-room structure which was converted into a summer home for a Civil War widow Mary Neosho Williams and her daughter Josepha, who earned the name Dr. Jo when she became one of the first women to earn a medical degree in Colorado. They hired Jock Spence to build the first cabin on the property which they dubbed "Camp Neosho." By 1918 Jock built many additions and finished construction on what is now a 17 room log home.

When Dr. Jo died in 1938, the property was sold to Darst Buchanan, a wealthy oilman from Tulsa, Oklahoma. He and his family renamed it the Hiwan Ranch, an Anglo-Saxon term meaning "members of a family household."

Jefferson County Open Space and the Jefferson County Historical Society purchased the structures in 1974 and they were placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The museum opened in 1975.

A tour guide will take you through the rooms which have been restored to their appearance from the period of 1915-1930 to reveal the stories of each family and Hiwan's rich history.

You can walk around on your own outside the main building and visit the rest of the ranch, walk the nature trail, and go inside the tents or other cabins. The guided tour is free and despite the fact I got there when they were closed the very nice tour guide happily stayed late to give one more tour.

The Hiwan Homestead is another great space that is changing peoples perception of what a museum is. I say good riddance to the stuffy buildings with their exhibits in glass cases and signs that say "Don't touch!" Museums are breaking outside their boundaries and I welcome the new interpretation of what a museum is. A museum can be a log cabin or an old tenement or it might not be in a building at all. It can be outdoors with fossils that are encased in the side of a mountain. The most important change in the role of museums is that they are no longer formal spaces where visitors are passively looking at art or objects. I think the best museums are the informal and non-conventional ones which are inviting their visitors to become a part of the exhibit thereby creating a much more rich and valuable experience.

What makes a museum a museum?

On my trip to Colorado, I went to visit historic Georgetown. It's a quiet lazy little town located 45 miles west of Denver. You can park for free in any of the public parking lots and take a self-guided walking tour of the downtown area. If you stop by the Gateway Visitor Center when you enter into Georgetown you can pick up a map and get directions, drink some free coffee or hot chocolate, and speak to the very friendly staff who can answer all of your questions.

I really enjoyed wandering around the town and checking out all of the unique stores. Buffalo burgers are a specialty in the many restaurants you can choose from as well as homemade ice cream and candy. I never thought an Oreo couldn't get any better but then I found one covered in chocolate!

I could have been very content sampling the homemade candies all day but instead, I made the mistake of buying a ticket for the Georgetown Loop Railroad. For an overpriced $22.50 you can purchase a ticket for an hour-long train ride described as:

"a fun adventure that will thrill the entire family. The beauty of the rugged Rocky Mountains surrounds you as an old-time steam locomotive or one of our powerful diesel locomotives winds up the Clear Creek Canyon, hauling your train past the remains of several gold and silver mines".

This might have been true had the heavens not opened up and poured buckets of rain onto our open car. All of the passengers had to either seek shelter in one of the fully-enclosed cars or stay where they were and get drenched. Inside the fully enclosed car, the view was obstructed which didn't really matter because it was raining so hard that you couldn't see anything anyway. Of course the term "fully enclosed" is not entirely accurate because there was no glass in the windows. The sides were open to let all the rain in.

We stopped in Silver Plume just 20 minutes later to pick up more passengers. This is the part of the "hour-long train ride" I wasn't informed about. I found out that the train ride is in reality only 20 minutes up to Silver Plume, a 20 minute stop, and then 20 minutes back on the same route we came.

There was nothing to do in Silver Plume but spend money in their gift shop or go to the museum. I chose the museum which was yet another misleading disappointment.

I walked inside a building that was old and dirty and pretty much empty with the exception of two old trains. There really wasn't much to look at anyway since everything was roped off preventing visitors from being able to go inside the trains. I tried very hard to get a peek inside but there was nothing in there anyway. There were no labels or signs to even tell you what it was that you were (or weren't) looking at. There wasn't even any staff to answer questions.

This really was a shame because one of the trains appeared to be a postal train and there was a lot of potential there to create an interesting exhibit. I could think of a ton of fun exhibit ideas for this but in my opinion, if you plunk a dirty old train down in the middle of a room that doesn't make it a museum. I think they could use the revenue from the hundreds of tickets they sell every day to at least install some labels and clean the cobwebs off the trains.

Of course this got me thinking about what it is that really makes a museum a museum. Is it the artifacts, the building, the information, the docents, or some combination of these things that turn a room full of stuff into a museum? I'll be exploring this topic some more in future posts but I'd be interested in hearing what other people think defines a museum. Please feel free to post your comments.