Museum of History and Industry - 1st Floor

I'm back, with more in-depth descriptions of the Museum of History and Industry's Grand Opening. Since there was so much to see, I'm going to do one floor per post.

So, Thursday, December 27, 2012, was a grey day, with a few sunbreaks off in the distant clouds, but still threatening to rain all morning. Getting to the museum could have been a challenge: not only has MOHAI moved to a new location we'd need to find, but the main street (Mercer) to the area has been getting a facelift all year, changing the street from one-way that veers immediately after exiting the freeway to a two-way six-lane road. It was our first time in that part of Seattle since the street was redone, so it would be all new to us. Luckily, we didn't go the wrong way at any point :) Whew! Okay, now we could find a parking spot and go in.

MOHAI at Lake Union (picture from KIRO TV)

The building's exterior is absolutely stunning. It used to be a naval armory, and now the bright white paint and blue accents make it look sharp. From the south side, it looks impressive; from the west side (the main entrance), it looks breathtaking.

When you first walk into the museum and pass the information desk, you're amazed by how expansive it seems. The first floor atrium is wide open, and as I mentioned yesterday, the upper floors don't go all the way across the building: the second floor lines the wall, and the third and fourth floors are only on the north side of the building.

Main staircase leading up to floors 2-4. Notice the original Boeing B-1 airplane overhead.

To the right, there's a picture box-like display of models and artifacts: the Rainier R; a model of Mt. St. Helens (I think. I don't remember seeing it say "Mt. St. Helens," so maybe it's a generic mountain/volcano); a model of a Boeing airplane; a model of the Hat & Boots from the Georgetown gas station; a "Greetings from Seattle" postcard; a model of the Kalakala ferry; a model of the cougar Eddie Bauer shot on his property; a sign from the Dog House restaurant; Black Bart, who welcomed visitors to the 1962 World's Fair; a Rainier Beer bottle and bottle opener from the commercials; and one of Ivar's clams. What's more, this is the first interactive exhibit you run across: turning various hand cranks lights up the R, makes the volcano spew lava, lights up the box for Hat & Boots, changes the Seattle postcard to another scene, lights up the Kalakala, hides Eddie Bauer's cougar behind bushes, moves plates at the Dog House, makes Black Bart draw his gun, makes the bottle opener approach the Rainier bottle, and makes Ivar's clam dance, respectively.

Hanging from the ceiling to the left is the Slo-mo-shun IV hydroplane, and hanging almost directly above you is the original Boeing B-1 airplane.

A nifty thing they have going on in the museum are the towers, most of which are highly interactive. There are four towers--three on the east side of the building, one in the southwest corner--and each tower spans (can you span vertically?) the first two floors. Each tower has its own theme, and since they rise up two floors, that comes out to eight themes, total. The first-floor towers are Building a Game (how video games go from concept to production), Building a City (a little playroom for kids where they can play with blocks to make a neighborhood), Starting a Business, and Shaping Our City.

Participant = exhibit

Shaping Our City is a damn cool interactive exhibit, if I may use such a naughty word in describing a piece of Culture. This portion of the tower, smartly, is a great companion to the upper-floor theme, Personal Stories. The Shaping Our City tower allows visitors to answer a series of questions, like "How do you deal with the rain?", "Why did you come to the museum today?", "What brought you to the Seattle area?" and "How do you take your coffee?" The profiles then created are amazing for two reasons: One, they become part of the exhibit. On the outside of the tower are pictures of famous local people, the type of pictures you'd see at a historical museum. The tower's wall, though, also includes three frames, which display pictures people took of themselves while answering the questionnaire inside. I LOVED that part! *We* become part of history! Here's this wall of newsmakers' pictures, and here's a picture of a visitor, right in the display, like she's a noteworthy person, too. Not only that, but inside the tower, visitors can then read others' profile on the display screens. Select a profile to view, and the screen will show you that person's answers to two of the questions.

I'm famous! "How do you handle the rain?"

The second really cool thing about the Shaping Our City exhibit is that the information gathered from the questionnaires is then collected to learn statistics about the museum's visitors. For example, I think one stat I read said that 2% of the visitors that morning came from Peru!
 
I think by the time my mom and I got to this point in our exploration, we'd already been at the museum for an hour, and had lost my dad twice. But it was fun! And thanks Mom, for having the genius idea of taking a picture of my UW sweatshirt as my profile pic. She's so smart! I could be in the exhibit without actually having to have *my face* be a part of it :) The one sad thing about this exhibit is that the computer only holds 32 profiles, so once 32 people have come in after you, your profile goes *poof*. The answers, though, are still part of the museum's statistics. So even though no one after about 1 pm on Thursday saw my picture or could view my profile, I still count as part of the small percentage of people who answered that they don't drink coffee, or the percentage who said they came to the museum because they're interested in local history :)

After we finished playing with that, my mom and I went back outside the tower and stood there, waiting to see if my picture would pop up on the wall display. We waited a few minutes, but it never did (and I later went back and watched for a few more minutes a few hours later :D ), so we finally moved on to the second floor, which I'll describe in my next post. Stay tuned!

(Oh, I'll also mention that the first floor has two bathrooms, the original Lincoln Toe Truck, the Compass Cafe, and the temporary gift shop.)


Some other articles about the new MOHAI:
The Kitsap Sun, 12/28/12
Seattle Times, 12/7/12
KOMO, 12/29/12