Moving history

Joseph Landor on June 29, 2011 in College Entry

For the past 10 years, Kim England has sent her “Geography of Cities” class of 150 students to the Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI), located right past Husky Stadium and across the Montlake Bridge — just blocks away from campus.

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A model of the new location of the MOHAI gives an overview of the new layout.

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A ledger book documents donations to the museum.

The museum, England said, tells a “people’s history,” combining art, technology, industry and commerce with the personal narratives of those in Seattle’s past.

In the class, which studies the historical development of cities, MOHAI has provided an ideal visual history to accompany the concepts she teaches.

But beginning next year, England’s students will have to travel just a bit farther to make the visit: In November 2012, MOHAI will relocate to a new location in South Lake Union. The move is the first ever for the museum in its 59-year history; its current building in Montlake is being demolished for SR520 road expansion.

“It’s a bit of a bummer from the perspective of sending the students across the bridge [to visit], but it’s not like it’s moving to Canada,” England said.

In the spirit of the move, an exhibit titled “MOHAI Moves History” is currently featured at the museum, which tells the six-decade story of the museum’s past and includes information about the new location.

“It recounts the history of the building and the institutions that use it — like the King County Historical Society and Seattle Historical Society — as they move out of that building,” MOHAI art historian Paul Dorpat said.

Dorpat is one of the art historians of another currently featured exhibit titled “Now & Then,” which is one of the last exhibits in the Montlake building.

This exhibit uses “repeat photography” to compare the same point of view of historical images with contemporary photos and visually illustrates changes in Seattle’s past.

Despite the inevitable move, Dorpat said those at MOHAI are optimistic about the potential for more foot traffic at its new location.

“I think [those at the museum] are happy about moving to a new location which is more centrally located,” he said. “I think maybe they think they’ll get more people coming to the museum at the south end of the lake.”

Some popular attractions of the museum include the pink “Toe Truck,” a Rainier Brewery commercial beer-man suit, and the Alki Landing Diorama, depicting settlers from 1851 first arriving at Alki.

But its resources extend well beyond the typical collections of photographs and historical artifacts — MOHAI also features off-site summer walking tours and short video segments called “MOHAI Minutes” that cover local spots like the Admiral Theatre in West Seattle and Schmitz Park near Alki. “MOHAI Minutes” even has its own YouTube channel.

The museum also shows movies in the basement and has regular speakers, like bestselling author Steve Berry, who is scheduled to lead a writer’s workshop August 6.

“Those are things that will sustain them,” England said.

As a student in England’s class last year, Junior Tiffany Oh visited MOHAI for the very first time. Before her visit, Oh said that she was somewhat unfamiliar with the museum.

Yet on that visit she particularly remembers being wowed by the “Boomtown” exhibit, a town of buildings displaying facets of Seattle’s history beginning from the end of the 19th century. She also retained some interesting tidbits about Seattle’s history, like learning the names of the first African American and Chinese American who lived in Seattle.

“There are a lot of things in Seattle’s past that I didn’t know about before,” she said. “It’s an important history museum, stuff you don’t get to see at [places like] the Pacific Science Center and the EMP.”

Experiences like Oh’s are what England hopes for when she assigns her students field assignments for the course, like visiting MOHAI.

“I want them to come away thinking that the city is not something in terms of a built environment, … the city is not something that is neutral,” England said. “Most of the time, there are reasons why some things in the city look the way they do, why some buildings look the way they do. By having them go do this they get a sense of how it looked previously. I’m trying to give them different ways of thinking about a city.”

Senior Taylor Youtsler also visited MOHAI as a part of England’s class and, to his surprise, found the museum enlightening.

“I thought I knew most of the history of Washington and Seattle, but when I went in there it was kind of amazing the fact that I didn’t even know half of what I should have and I was living here the whole time,” he said. “Everyone [who visits] is going to learn a whole lot, that’s a given. Just by going in there, it’s a good experience.”

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