Exhibits

The Museum was excited to provide two new exhibits in the past few years.

In April of 2007 the Museum had a grand opening for its Flauschink Exhibit. Flauschink, a spring holiday, was started in 1969 by George Sibley, among others, to celebrate the “flushing out of winter and welcoming of spring.” This colorful display was largely due to the generous donation from Frances Somrak of her husband Johnny’s entire button collection from the first thirty-eight years of this unique Crested Butte festival. Pictures from the Museum’s collection are on display along with annual photo albums of Flauschink. Trophies that were awarded from different events such as parades, tug-of-war and Calcutta races were also donated to complete the exhibit. This exhibit was supplemented by a memorial fund for Martha Sporcich.

In February of 2008, our new Textile Exhibit had its grand opening. Funds were raised from throughout the valley to allow to Museum to permanently protect all our textiles, which have never been seen by the public.

Our previous Curator, Melissa Belz, went to advanced textile courses in Illinois to learn the art of textile protection and upkeep. With her newly gained knowledge she was able to properly preserve our clothing as well as supervise the construction of locally designed cases and the purchasing of proper mannequins for the protection of articles on display. This exhibit changes with the seasonal openings of the Museum.

Our newly hired Collection manager, Brooke Murphy, brings a rich background to the Museum. In her first few months, she has chnaged some of our exhibits: please come see her work!

Currently the display contains the cheerleader outfit from local Mary Jo Somrak from 1955 and a band cape from the same era. The Museum is always looking for more clothing to put on display and is willing to take articles on loan for a season. If you have any clothing you would like to donate or seasonally lend to the Museum please contact the Curator or the Executive Director.

The Train Exhibit has continued to grow over the past year. The dedicated volunteers have been putting in a large number of hours building structures and landscaping. Susan Anderton created a fantastic mural for the exhibit, recreating the bench, Colorado Fuel and Iron buildings, and Gibson’s Ridge. In addition to all of their hard work the exhibit has just made a large leap forward. The First Baptist Church of Simla, CO has agreed to donate its extensive collection of HO scale model buildings and trains. This donation is worth thousands of dollars and thousands of hours in volunteer time.

With this donation some noticeable “population density” increases will take place in the train exhibit. Volunteer David Watkins is planning on picking up the collection. There is a need for more experienced volunteers to join the efforts, if you or anyone you know is interested in train modeling please have them contact the Museum.