Museum Debut
Saturday, March 10, 2007
It’s a smaller Hall. But that may be one of its strengths.
By now, the National Teachers Hall of Fame has settled rather comfortably into its new home in Visser Hall on the Emporia State University campus. In fact, a visitor could be forgiven for thinking he’d walked into a small art museum.
There’s the track lighting. The dark walls. The soft carpeting. Everything is positioned just right to show the displays and exhibits for maximum effect without being intrusive.
Even the seemingly cluttered shelves in the corners reveal hidden depths on examination. Rulers, fans, film projectors, all have the power to capture your eye without warning.
“It’s got so many neat scenes that catch your attention,” said Boyce Baumgardner, the Hall’s chairman of the board. “You could spend hours looking around carefully.”
If you’ve been waiting for a special occasion to see the new Hall, by the way, your opportunity has arrived. As part of the inauguration week festivities for ESU President Michael Lane at the end of this month, the Hall will hold a special open house on March 29. The open house will be from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., although the Hall will still keep its usual hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The new layout, like the old one at 1320 C of E Drive, is the brainchild of curator Harry Hart. And while it took some imagination to fit the essentials into the 900-square-foot space — about a third of the old display area — Hart said it was worth it.
“I think probably, having to reduce it in size, we did a lot more focusing and it worked real well,” Hart said. “It feels more like a ‘real museum’ you might find in a large community, like an art gallery or the Smithsonian Institute. It’s a little more upscale than it used to be.”
That’s not bad for a storeroom that started out with concrete floors and a ton of electronic equipment to move out from its days as a television studio.
And once the Hall moved in in October, the organizers found out how much of its former space had just been ... well, space.
“We had a lot of space to fill out there,” said Jenny Harder, the Hall’s director of induction and recognitions. “But I don’t feel that anything that makes the Hall of Fame unique and special is not here.”
Of course there aren’t the big windows that the old Hall had. But that also means there’s more wall space and that the lighting is more controllable. Hart even found a way to spill out into the hallway, putting up posters that show different people and things connected to the Hall.
Hart will retire later this year. But he can do so knowing that he’s transformed something special.
“It’s been fun,” he said.