Clack Museum to be closed for a month

The H, Earl Clack Memorial Museum will be closed from Saturday to Feb. 17 because of budgetary problems and to give volunteers a chance to clean up.

Museum Board Chair Judi Dritshulas said the museum is running short on money.

Cash-strapped Hill County commissioners, who provide some funding for the museum, are urging the museum to become self-funding by relying more on the museum’s foundation, she said.

“That’s difficult to do when we are undertaking a pretty large project of our own,” she said, referring to the gradual move of museum operations to the Griggs Printing building in downtown Havre.

During the month, museum manager Jim Spangelo will take vacation time and will be on furlough for a while, she said. He has volunteered to come in once a week to catch up on clerical and administrative matters.

If the museum has to close at all, this is the time to do it, she said. This is usually the slowest time of the year.

Every Saturday during the month, board members and volunteers will be cleaning the museum floor, woodwork and exhibits, she said.

Some of the work will have to be done with great care, she said, because the exhibits are fragile.

Val Hickman, the archivist at Montana State University-Northern’s Vande Bogart Library and a museum board member, will be working with the volunteers, she said.

Dritshulas said that in an effort to raise money, the board will hold a downton Abbey-themed fundraiser Saturday, April 30.

Karen Vosen, an expert quilter, has donated a quilt to be raffled off, she said.

“It should be a nice fundraiser,” Dritshulas said.

County officials have said that natural gas wells have been capped and taxes on the rest of county taxpayers are at their limit.

Commissioner Mark Peterson has suggested that the commissioners may go to the voters asking for a mill levy increase so the county can continue to fund basic services.