CONTACT US
FOLLOW US
Alyssa Evans
aevans@dailyastorian.com
facebook.com/
DailyAstorian
THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, JULY 3, 2021 • B1
A NEW
HISTORY
The Columbia Pacifi c Heritage Museum
returns with new features, free admission
By RAY GARCIA
For The Astorian
A
fter closing in March 2020, only
to reopen in October, then close
once again, the Columbia Pacifi c
Heritage Museum is back in action.
The museum will offi cially welcome
back patrons starting Wednesday after a
year-and-a-half of forced closures, staff
changes and renovations — including a
major overhaul of the museum’s galleries
and exhibits.
“We’re reopening to kind of an
entirely new experience, one that people
will remember,” said Madeline Moore,
the museum’s executive director.
As an added bonus, admission to the
museum is free until the end of the year,
thanks to the donations from museum
members and the Port of Ilwaco.
At the end of every year, the muse-
um’s staff usually invites its members to
donate for a specifi c project that’s occur-
ring at the time. This year, the museum
asked donors to help make the museum
free for visitors through 2021.
“The response was really great and
people were really excited to donate,”
Moore said. “They wanted (others) to be
able to come to the museum and not have
to worry about paying a fee.”
What’s new
During its shuttered state, the museum
saw its period of inactivity as an opportu-
nity to improve its space and the content
within it. One of the fi rst projects com-
pleted included installing a new roof —
a task that had been on museum staff ’s
to-do list for around 10 years, Moore said.
“We have been able to do all of these
projects that have been on the back burner
for many years, and that’s been a pretty
big boon to us,” she said.
Due to severe water damage from a
storm that took place in January 2020,
the Village Gallery received a make-
over using the funds from an insurance
claim. From repainting the entire gallery
to putting in a new fl oor, the museum staff
aimed to restore and freshen up the gal-
lery’s space.
“We kind of reconfi gured (the gallery)
and moved a bunch of exhibits around,
and opened up a lot of space in there
so that we can display some new things
that weren’t on display before we did the
remodel,” Moore said.
The Chinook Gallery, Resource Gal-
lery and Life Saving Gallery also received
new fl ooring and have been refreshed
with some new content.
A new addition to the m useum is a
special exhibit called, “Black & White
and Read All Over: Local Photographs
and the Stories They Tell.”
Throughout the pandemic, the muse-
um’s staff kept busy by fi nding photo-
graphs within the museum’s collection,
then researching the backstory of the
photos and sharing the fi ndings on social
media. After the posts gained consider-
able engagement online, the museum’s
staff decided to create an exhibit featur-
ing 25 of the most liked posts from the
project.
“Some of these had like huge reaches
of over tens of thousands of people,
which was something that we had never
experienced before with our social media
reach,” Moore said.
The special exhibit will be available
until Sept. 11.
TOP: Members of the Ilwaco Volunteer Fire Department install a historic sign for one of
the galleries. ABOVE: Some of the museum’s new exhibits off er a window into the past.
Keeping legacies alive
In many ways, rural museums and cul-
tural centers act as the heart of their com-
munities. They preserve important arti-
facts from the past, but also work to tell
the stories of those who came before .
“There are many generations of the
same family living in this community
that have been here since it was founded,
and Indigenous communities as well,”
Moore said. “So we are really responsible
for making sure that those legacies live
on and that they’re able to be taught and
shared with other people.”
As the staff at the museum prepare for
its grand reopening, Moore said they feel
blessed to have been able to use the clo-
sure as a means of revamping the space
and what it off ers. However, it also
reminded Moore of how the pandemic
caused the closure of many museums and
cultural centers across the nation, with
more predicted to follow.
“To see where we are on very stable
fi nancial footing and with whole new gal-
leries and a new exhibit for people to see,
coming out of a global pandemic, is pretty
impressive and something that we’re very
proud of.”
Ray Garcia is a contributor for The
Astorian and Coast Weekend.
A look at a new wall of historic signage from local businesses on the Long Beach Peninsula.
A linotype machine sits in one of the new
exhibits in the Village Gallery.
The Village
remodel.
Gallery
undergoes
a