June 26, 2002

Heritage Center makes history


Herald photos by Garret Leiva
With scissors in hand, volunteers, community members and local dignitaries official open the Grand Traverse Heritage Center Saturday afternoon during an open house at the former city library on Sixth Street.

Ribbon cutting ceremony marks $1.25 million renovation

By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
       With a flourish of scissors wielded by a range of community members, a ribbon cutting ceremony Saturday formally welcomed the Grand Traverse Heritage Center to the ranks of Traverse City institutions.
      The "doable project" is now, for the most part, done.
      From vision to reality in fewer than three years, the $1.25 million renovation to the former library has drawn wide acclaim.
      "It is pretty wonderful, a big community effort," said Ted Foley, a volunteer with the Heritage Center and one of the key players in the renovation.
      "This is a long way from Mrs. Schaub reading 'Eentsy, Weentsy Spider' here in 1969," said State Representative Jason Allen. "Historically, this is an important part of our community and important for our children coming up."
      The former library was originally built in 1904 on land donated by Perry Hannah, one of the area's founders. An addition built in the early 1960s doubled the building's size to 15,000 square feet.
      Transforming this space into the Grand Traverse Heritage Center was the culmination of the vision, effort and money of hundreds of volunteers and donors. From stripping floors and painting walls to asking for donations and managing workers, volunteers have logged more than 33,000 hours of work on the center since January of 2000.
      "This has truly been a grass roots community effort," noted Ann Hoopfer, director of the Grand Traverse Heritage Center. "It was just sort of one of those things where there was not going to be another opportunity and if we let it go by we would regret it."
      Support for the renovation came from all areas of the community: organizations, service clubs, individuals, businesses and banks. The capital campaign got off to a roaring start, raising $800,000 in less than one year. Although nearly a $1 million has been raised to date, another $250,000 is needed, plus organizers hope to seed an endowment fund with $400,000.
      "I think going into it we knew we would have a lot of community support, even though there were several other big campaigns for multi-millions of dollars," Hoopfer noted.
      After the ribbon cutting, the nearly 200 attendees checked out the renovations and future exhibits of the Con Foster Museum.
      The museum will be housed in the original 7,500-square foot Carnegie building, whose gleaming wood floors, restored decorative plaster and sparkling, floor-to-ceiling windows provide a backdrop to presentations on the region's history.
      "I've worked at a lot of museums and most museums only dream of this community support," said Daniel Truckey, curator for the Grand Traverse Heritage Center. "This is more than just a static place with exhibits but a living place with events and you're going to want to come back here again and again."
      The Heritage Center is home to six area historical organizations, whose offices are located in the more modern addition to the former library:
      - Maritime Heritage Alliance
      - Friends of the Con Foster Museum
      - Grand Traverse Pioneer and Historical Society
      - Traverse Area Rock and Mineral Club
      - Railroad Historical Society of Northwest Michigan
      - Women's History Project
      The Grand Traverse Heritage Center will also feature the Record-Eagle Library Archives, a collection of historical documents including a variety of publications, periodicals and other historical documents.
      The center also boasts three public meeting rooms, including a community room that can hold 200 people, a classroom for 60 and a boardroom that can seat 20.
      Peg Jonkhoff, chair of the Capital Campaign for the Grand Traverse Heritage Center, believes the facility will quickly become a new community center, the heart of Traverse City.
      "This was our vision, we could see this and it is so rewarding to see it done," Jonkhoff said. "It is just a jewel, the perfect word for the finished product."
      "It is a win-win situation, such a nice combination and reuse of the building that I think Hannah and Carnegie would be thrilled," she noted.
     
A one-room school house is recreated in this display in the exhibit galleries housed inside the Grand Traverse Heritage Center. The original 1904 Carnegie Library reading rooms and book galleries have become the Exhibit Galleries where the combined collections of several local historical societies will be displayed along with the Con Foster Museum collection.




Ready to have their cake and eat it too, nearly $1 million has been raise with approximately $250,000 more needed to complete renovations at the Grand Traverse Heritage Center. The building will house Friends of the Con Foster Museum, Grand Traverse Pioneer and Historical Society, Maritime Heritage Alliance and Railroad Historical Society of Northwest Michigan, as well as the Grand Traverse Rock and Mineral Club and the Women’s History Project.




These tiles, with affixed bits of memories from community members, will eventually adorn a wall leading upstairs into the Grand Traverse Heritage Center exhibit galleries.


Workers renovating the Heritage Center removed dropped ceilings, old paint and carpeting to expose what the former Carnegie Library looked like in the 19th century.


Visitors walk past newly constructed glass display cases in the Margaret D. and Harry A. Towsley Gallery reflecting both the Native American and early pioneers of the Grand Traverse region.