DENVER Kids today wont know how lucky they are.
A field trip to the history museum used to mean hours of staring at artifacts in poorly lit glass cases.
From now on, though, Colorado kids will remember the states new history museum as the place with the ski jump simulator.
The new Colorado History museum in downtown Denver opens to the public today, and historians did not use the move simply to get a bigger place to show off the same old displays. Instead, they re-imagined the whole idea of what a museum is supposed to be.
This is kind of blasphemy, but we dont see our job to teach history. Nobodys coming here to take a class on Colorado history, said State Historian Bill Convery. We cant give an exam, or assign a paper, as much as Id love to. This is a discretionary experience, and for many of our visitors and their families, its a form of entertainment.
So that means an exhibit on Steamboat Springs includes a Nordic ski jumping simulator, where visitors can step into skis, feel the wind in their hair and try to keep their balance as a video screen shows their trip down the ramp and through the air.
In a re-creation of the Eastern Plains town of Keota, visitors can sit in a Model T Ford. And inside a silver mine, they can set up simulated dynamite charges and try not to blow themselves up.
Its all part of a new ethic in museum design that stresses interaction, storytelling and immersive, emotional experiences.
Museum directors have learned that the word history is a barrier to getting people interested in the past, Convery said. So instead, the new History Colorado museum focuses on the story part of the
H word.
By telling stories about the past, we thought that was an avenue to hook peoples interest, Convery said.
The main exhibit hall is called Colorado Stories, and Southwest Colorado gets a starring role, with two of the eight exhibits.
An showcase about mining features a re-creation of a Silverton mine from the 1880s, complete with a simulated ride down a mine shaft elevator.
An exhibit on the Ute Indian tribes sits in the center of the hall.
Ute people have been here longer than anybody else, so we put it right in the center so the other stories would radiate out from the Ute people, Convery said.
Historians worked with Ute Mountain Ute spiritual leader Terry Knight and former Southern Ute Chairman Matthew Box to create the displays.
As much as Converys staff wanted to make the museum fun, the exhibits recognize that history isnt always a laughing matter.
They tell the story of Sand Creek an 1864 massacre of more than 400 Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians by a Colorado militia through sounds, artifacts and graphic images.
Another exhibit re-creates a cabin at Camp Amache, where Japanese Americans from the West Coast were forcibly removed during World War II.
Exhibits will rotate in and out of the Colorado Stories hall, and other sections of the museum will open later.
Were going to be opening and opening and then opening again between now and the end of 2014, Convery said.
History Colorados $110 million new home is the latest in a swath of museums that have sprung up on the south side of downtown Denver. Its across the street from the 2006 expansion of the Denver Art Museum, and two blocks from the Clyfford Still Museum, which opened last fall.
The state issued $340 million in bonds in 2009 for a major downtown reconstruction project that includes the new museum. The old museum used to share the block south of the state Capitol with the Supreme Court.
Both buildings were demolished. History Colorado moved a block further south, and a new justice center is being built on the original block. It will include space for the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court, the attorney generals office and other state legal divisions.
The museum will be open seven days a week.
We see ourselves sort of the gateway drug for an interest in history. If we can spark an interest and spark curiosity in one of our visitors ... then weve done our job. Weve started them down the road of a very rewarding path of lifetime learning, Convery said.
