Museum board looking at fairground focus

Two members of the Hill County museum board told the board Monday that, along with opening some of its property on the Great Northern Fairgrounds during the fair, the board should shift its focus to doing some work on that property.

Gary Wilson, vice-chair of the H. Earl Clack Museum Board, and board member Val Hickman worked Monday morning on cleaning and preparing the historic Faber School for its showing Saturday afternoon during the fair.

Hickman said the interior of the schoolhouse, a 108-year-old log building from the Bear Paw Mountains 20 miles south of Havre, and a historic homesteader shack also on the fairgrounds, are needing some repair work. One example is plaster that is starting to crack and will start falling off the walls if not repaired, she said.

“There are a lot of delayed projects … ,” Hickman said. “We need to do something about it.”

One project on the school is progressing, with the Montana Historical Society awarding a $4,000 grant to repair the roof on the building.

The museum was housed on the fairgrounds when it was created in 1965, and remained there until 1996, when it first moved to the former U.S. Courthouse and post office, then to Holiday Village Mall.

Wilson said the board has focused on other projects — a main project was moving the museum to its present location in Holiday Village, as well as updating and improving displays — and needs to shift its focus to preserving the fairgrounds items.

“We’ve had so much to do with the museum that we’ve neglected that … ,” Wilson said. “We just need to get back and do some work on them.”

He praised fairgrounds manager Tim Solomon for work he has done on the caboose, located near the campgrounds, and said he believes the fair board will appreciate any work the museum board can do on its property.

While the museum board is continuing work on the museum itself, including starting a new rotating display called “Gramma’s Attic,” updating displays and equipment and working to revise its gift shop, it has completed many of its major projects there.

Work also is ongoing, but much is completed, on the Wahkpa Chu’gn Buffalo Jump archaeological site behind the mall.

The site displays actual archaeological digs, where Native Americans drove bison off the bluff and slaughtered them. Three distinct cultures have been identified as using the site at different times starting at least 2,000 years ago.

New buildings have been erected over some of the displays, and a new interpretive center, named in honor of archaeologist John Brumley and his wife, Anna, manager of the site, opened last spring.

Anna Brumley told the board Monday that some work still needs to be done. She said she is looking into a couple of different ideas on how to keep the exhibit houses cooler including simply adding windows that could be opened to let the air circulate better. The exhibit houses can be 10 degrees or more hotter than outside temperatures, and she shuts the site down if the temperature hits 100 degrees —

Some leaking still is occurring on some of the exhibit buildings, and she is working with a contractor to plan repairing that problem, Brumley said.

Another problem is the railing on the steps down from the visitor center and main entrance to the exhibits, she said. The railing is starting to weather, and needs to be sealed to prevent someone from getting slivers from it, Brumley said.

Monday, contractors also removed some defunct exhibit buildings and did some work removing some concrete and spreading gravel.

“We’re just so pleased. It looks so nice,” Brumley said.

She said, with some expenses on projects coming in lower than expected, the site has some money left from grant funding, and that might be enough to pay for the work needed.

Brumley also said she is reviving an effort, started in 1999, to have the site’s status upgraded on the National Registry of Historic Places, and also is looking into seeking a nomination to be listed by the United Nations as a world heritage site.

The World Heritage Site designation, according to the U.N Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization website, is for sites with “outstanding universal value” which meet at least one out of ten selection criteria.

Montana contains part of two of the United State’s 21 world heritage sites, Yellowstone National Park and Waterton Glacier International Peace Park.

The board endorsed both the attempt to upgrade the registry and to seek a nomination as a world heritage site.