PORT TOWNSEND — One day, the Jefferson County Historical Society expects its museum will sport high tech electronics to tell the stories and hands-on activities to entertain.
Staff and board members got a look this week at plans for new $750,000 multi-media, interactive exhibits at the Jefferson County Historical Museum.
When plans are finalized, the museum makeover will enter the design and development stage, which is expected to be completed in a few months, said Bill Smith of Storyline Studio of Seattle, who designed the exhibits.
The projected start of the capital campaign for the new exhibits is 2011.
The historical society has a head start: Half of a $200,000 grant that the historical society received from the state Heritage Capital Project Fund will pay for the creation of one of the four galleries planned, while the other half funded the plan by Storyline Studio.
Once money is raised for the project, it will go out to bid nationally to companies that specialize in building museum exhibits, Smith said.
What’s in store
Among the plans:
• A 65-inch, high definition LCD screen and digital picture frames in the judge’s chamber.
• Multiple projection screens that can be raised and lowered behind the judge’s high bench.
• Interactive touch screens and murals around two walls of the courtroom.
• A child-sized “Little Town” with frontier storefronts in the stable of the 19th century fire hall.
The museum occupies the original courtroom and fire hall on the main floor and the old jail in the basement of the brick building at 540 Water St., a national historic landmark built in 1892.
On the second floor, the building houses the only continuously used city council chambers in Washington state.
The building underwent a major restoration under the direction of Victorian interiors expert Barbara Marseille.
Completed in 2006, it was funded by a joint public/private partnership, including grants from national and state historic trusts.
Four galleries
The new exhibit plan consists of four galleries.
The first, in the antechamber off the courtroom, will resemble a library with tall bookshelves lining three walls and a media center on the fourth.
An overview of Jefferson County history and geography, it will introduce the museum’s “City of Dreams” theme with a video called “We Came with Dreams.”
In the courtroom, Port Townsend’s “Boom to Bust and Back” saga will be conveyed by images on projection screens and touch screens that will raise and lower over the wall and windows.
The floor space originally used for courtroom seating will be filled with six large vertical glass cases, each 8 feet to 9 feet tall, that will hold artifacts based on such themes as local commerce and first peoples.
The mural will feature people who played a part in Jefferson County history and connect to a time line and touch screens running around the walls.
In the fire hall, vertical glass cases and “curiosity cabinets” on the walls will hold exhibits on logging, maritime history, etc., and interactive stations — tying knots and using a pulley to hoist a bucket being two suggestions.
The stable area, which still has the hoof prints of the horses that pulled the fire wagons, will be transformed into a miniature Water Street, with storefronts facing a faux wharf bordering a square of blue foam.
Children will be able to explore the miniature, low-ceilinged stores, then climb the circular staircase to the hayloft, where they can play with vintage toys and dolls.
In the basement, the men’s jail, with its dark, iron-barred cells, will be left in its original state except for shadow projections and ambient audio tracks of voices — including, perhaps, someone reading the words of Jack London, rumored to have spent the night there.
The women’s jail will be used for exhibit space. There are no plans to use the sub-street level exercise yard, exhibit planners said.
There are also no plans about what to do with the large wooden display cases, either now in use or in storage, most of which came out of Water Street retail shops, said Bill Tennent, historical society director.
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Port Townsend/Jefferson County reporter-columnist Jennifer Jackson can be reached at jjackson@olypen.com.
