Sonoma County Museum in the 90s

Sonoma County, a dynamic county combining agriculture and industry, city and country, creating unique and varied challenges for its citizens join us as we present some of the information and services provided by the county of Sonoma to help us as we move into the 21st century. Welcome

to Sonoma County in the 90s with your host Dana to Rico. Hello, I'm Dana D'Errico and welcome to Sonoma County in the nineties. Today, I have with me, a very fascinating lady who is new to Sonoma County. That is Donna Pen Well and she is the

new executive director of the Sonoma County Museum. So let's join her and find out what changes and fantastic things are going to be happening with our museum Donna. It's great to have you on the show. Thank you very much for inviting me. Welcome to Sonoma County.

You're fairly new resident here and you're just so full of all kinds of information. It's just fascinating. So where shall we begin? Do you wanna maybe tell us a little bit about yourself and where you came from and where you're going? Well, I'm very, very pleased

to have moved to Sonoma County. This is a place where I visited for the last 15 years that I've been here in California. I'm just moved up from Monterey actually. My home is in Pacific Grove. I still own my home there, but it's very comfortable here.

So I might be relocating very soon as far as buying a home up here. Um I'm formerly the director of the Maritime Museum of Monterey and it was a brand new building that we've put up. It's been since 1990 was when we first constructed that building

right on fisherman's wharf in Monterey. And prior to that, I worked for the city of Monterrey at the Colton Hall Museum. Of course, everyone that's taken fourth grade history should know that. That is where California constitution was signed in 18 49. And so coming to santa

rosa brand new thing. But lots of exciting things happening here. This is a good place to be right now. Earlier, before the show, you were talking about what you saw in Sonoma County being a new resident. Why don't you share that with our audience? Well, what

I can see right now is that all of Sonoma County and actually all of santa rosa in particular is really blossoming right now. Um, with all of our new residents in the, I just figured it out. It's the telecom valley area versus the Silicon Valley. There

are a lot of new interests that are moving into the area. Plus we have a real, just in this Sonoma County museum. A great 1910 post office moved to its location in 1982 and I was hired because we have a $27 million capital campaign that is

going to be happening over the next, We were thinking 5 to 8 years to really create a cultural campus for santa rosa and Sonoma County. Um, so as the director of the Sonoma County Museum. I've been charged with uh just figuring out how we're going to

do this and especially what we're gonna put in there. This is the cultural campus that they're proposing. Can you tell us what the building? I see, that they have it on the screen for our viewers? Great, well, right here in the main building, in the middle

is the 1910 post office. That was the building that was established in 1982 as the Sonoma County Museum. It's a fascinating building in itself and I just every day find some little nuance in the building that makes it so interesting. Uh And then we have in

mind to first work on the building side to the east where will be constructing a 5 to $7 million building, which will include gallery space, which we desperately need a cafe, which all museums these days have expanded gift shop, which again, we all love our museum

gift shops and a sculpture garden. So it's going to be a beautiful space. We hope to have that up and going within the next two years. So this is an ambitious program on the other side of the 1910 post office will be thinking about putting in

classroom space. Again, more gallery space. But most importantly over there, we need storage for our collections. Right now, we have our collections in three different places in Sonoma County and we need to consolidate those. So we really can get a good idea of what we have

because the Sonoma County Museum, believe it or not has some wonderful, wonderful artifacts. Can you are discussing that earlier? Also that um the collection is expansive. Can you tell us a little bit about what is in that collection, which we don't see in the museum apparently.

Well right now you're not going to see anything because my specialty is tearing things up and putting them back together. So, Um, we will be opening our new gallery for Sonoma County history on January two. So that's, we're working towards that right now. Well, tell us

about that event, the new gallery. Okay. Um, that's what we're working on right now, very intensively. As a matter of fact, the noise and the smells of the floors and the walls being restored is very, very exciting every day. Um The 1910 post office is a

beautiful, beautiful building. It was built uh the way I see it, I have to say right now, it was almost a phoenix out of the ashes of the 19 6 earthquake in downtown santa rosa. Uh they actually had decided to construct this building uh prior to

the earthquake. And so once the earthquake happened and almost all of santa rosa was flattened, Their money was already passed through Congress to build this brand new federal building right down in downtown Santa Rosa. You know what, it's not there anymore. We moved the building in

the late 1970s, early 1980s. It took quite a while to get that building moved over to where it is. But it is just a beautiful building. All redwood walls were restoring the maple floors right now and once that project is done, the walls are all redwood,

redwood. And um are you going to have a redwood finish then? It's going to be a natural redwood. How interesting. If you've been to the museum before, you never would have seen those walls into the museum because well they were covered by exhibits. And the whole

idea with museums today is we really like to feature the historic part of the building. So we are going to feature those beautiful walls and the, the maple floors were covered with carpeting. We've pulled up all that carpeting right now. We're in the process of restoration.

As far as turning the old mail room back into the mail room and turning the postmasters office back into an office. Is that the classical approach to a renovation to um turn the building and each room back to what it originally was In the museum field

today? That's generally the way you do things if you have a historic building. People are interested in the history of the building. I mean, did you know for instance that downstairs in the basement, we had a shooting range. Why would you have that in a 1910

post office. Well, when you think about what postal workers did, they carried mail from rural areas into the city. So you didn't have to get on your horse and buggy or in your car and get into town. Is the basement still in this building? Even though

it was relocated? It still is. But the shooting range isn't there? Well, go on. Are you gonna replace the shooting? Right, I don't think so. I think we've turned that into a very nice community space. Um as far as just a space where you can, we

can put up exhibits, we can have events, we can have meetings. My office used to be the shower area for the swing Shift. And so evidently the postal workers would work 24 hour shifts. So often they need showers and have a lunch room and things like

that. And that is all being restored. Not well, not my office. Um uh the main room downstairs where the mail room is all the floors are going back to the way they were. And one of the things that's been interesting and working with the floor folks

is they really wanted to make it just a beautiful, beautiful new floor. No, no, no, no, no. We want all of those nooks and crannies and all of the little beef. Exactly. Well, it shows that it it's been there. It has kind of a common sense

of needing to be, but as a gallery space that's really where the museum has uh and the board of directors has decided that we need to grow. It's a beautiful historic building. It is going to have house a wonderful exhibit on Sonoma County history. Tell us

about the exhibit. It's going to house the main, that's the main 1910 post office. Tell us what kind of history. Well, this is what I found to be most interesting about Sonoma County. You know, coming from Monterey County, we always thought we were the most important

because that's where California constitution was signed. No way Sonoma County is where California history as far as us history began even before that, the history of our native american population. Um, and just all of the early California history Valeo, all of our folks that we know

as far as California history. This is where it really started. So we'll be telling those stories on the first floor of the post office and they're going to be in very modern, interactive hands on kinds of exhibits. And that's what again we really need to think

about in a museum in the museum business today is we have to be able to interest our viewer. So, you know, we think about kids today and what they do. Video games, video games computers. So there's going to be high tech exhibits. It sounds like uh

but the other feature that is very important in museums today is they've got to be on wheels because we really do see ourselves as a cultural campus. and so we want to be able to use the space. It's a beautiful big space. The redwood walls, the

maple floors that we were talking about to um involve uh everything from weddings to dinner parties, to evening receptions. We've got to happening just this week um with our our art trails opening and we need to be able to have the space available so that it

does become a part of our cultural community. So we're thinking of museums more and more in these days to really um involve the entire community. So in addition to serving our visitors with these really interesting exhibits, modern, hands on interactive. Um we also have the whole

room available for other things. What are the now you've talked about the 1910 building? You've talked about a cafeteria, which will be, I'm sure a state of the art cafeteria. I want to hear about the art collection and the paintings you were just talking about that.

Are they going to go into this third building over here? To the far right, to the right here? Yes. This is what was most exciting to me when I took this job three months ago is um I heard that they were had this $27 million Okay,

what are we going to put in there? And as I said, uh there were collections that I needed to go and check out. Well down in the basement of the Sonoma County Museum. I found a fabulous collection of California artists from probably 1950 before 1900 to

1950. Uh probably 18 18 52 1950. What artists? William keith in particular? Mm hmm. Also just beautiful landscape artists. A number of different landscape artists that are represented in museums such as the Getty and the Oakland Museum. Absolutely beautiful. Um and so we're taking, we took

a good look at that. That was one of the first things we did. We have. We have about 75 paintings. They've all come into the collection donated by santa rosa, Sonoma County residents. And so it's very exciting. We need to pause here. Stay tuned. We'll be

right back with Sonoma County in the nineties. You're seeing a video of elephant training beatings are a daily part of a circus elephants life. Hi, I'm kim base singer. And this is tammy the elephant you just saw on that tape. We want to put an end

to elephants in circuses. We freed these two. Please help us free the rest. Thank you welcome back to Sonoma County in the nineties. Let's rejoin Donna pen. Well, our new director of the Sonoma County Museum. Now, Donna Back to the paintings. We have to have some

grace Hudson's, there must be some your paintings. Um there's just so many artists that came to Sonoma County to paint. Not only did they come to the county to paint, but finding that there are collectors and collections here in the county that are very exciting to

me and to have an opportunity to place them here in the county is very, very exciting. The last story in the world that I want to hear. And unfortunately I have heard this is that there is no place to put my painting here in the county.

So I've given it to the Palm Springs Desert Museum or I've given it to the Getty Museum. I don't want to hear that because these paintings have been here for 34 generations and we just have to have the opportunity to be able to display them and

share them with future generations. Well, I'm sure when you have your exhibits and like early California paintings or whatever you're going to be taking uh on loan donations also from our community. If people do have these paintings, is that correct? Or is that, No, that's very

correct. And as a matter of fact, one of the shows we have in mind when we do open this new wing is uh collection of not only going to the folks that live in the community, the individuals that live in the community, but it's become my

understanding that both Sonoma State and um are junior College. Both have collections of paintings and so to gather those together in one place and really highlight what this community owns, what this community can share the cultural arts that exist here in the history. It's very, very

rich in this county, which is surprising for an agricultural community. But it's there. I don't know if, I guess it is surprising and yet that part of our history is equally interesting as far as I'm concerned because when I go down to our warehouse for instance,

down in Los Gila coast and find these beautiful big silver, I don't know what they are kinds of objects And it turns out it represents our chicken industry for instance. They were silver awards from like state fairs and things. Yes. Yes. This was quite the chicken

capital in Petaluma basket of exactly apples. Well we were, yes, we were also the Prune King's Bride and now there are no prunes. Yes. Cinema County was also, there are towns here that we're The destinations for the very wealthy back in the 1800s for vacation spots

and they came here. They liked it. They stayed. So it's been a very interesting, very interesting community. Well, hops were another big industry here. The Grace Brothers santa rosa. So that has been equally interesting to me because of course when we think of who our audience

is when they come to the Sonoma County museum. A lot of our audience are Children and particularly 4th and 5th grade. That's when they study local history, 3rd, 4th, 5th and so it's so important to us to not only have those collections because somebody has to

say that, I mean, you know that's a good thing that we have those but also we can put them on display in an interesting manner so that we can share those memories with the kids that are growing up here and educate the Children too. That's a

great educational tool also. So I can see that you must have a something in mind for an educational program for the schools. Do you want to elaborate on that? Well the way again, the way museums are working today, you have to be fairly sophisticated with our

Children and their interests. And so at one point, I know about five years ago we really tried to focus in the museum about to put the museum in the school room. We're really turning that around in the museum field right now. When I write a grant

today I write a grant for the bus and a lunch. When they get to the museum instead of us going to the school room. We want the Children to come out of the school room and come to the museum to have that social and cultural experience

of come coming to a museum. They can learn their museum manners, look with your eyes not with your hands if you're tempted, keep your hands behind your back. You don't need to use your library voice necessarily, but just have that experience of getting in a bus

and then going to a museum and learning whatever is going to be taught there. But when they get their Children, we don't want them to act like wild indians either. So our wild kids. So what we really try to do is provide an experience with a

whole package. So our idea with our school groups right now is we have a planned experience. There's a package that goes out, uh, that is a pre learning experience that happens in the music in the classroom itself. Then they come to the museum. They have a

very strict guided program. It's not strict. It's, we have a lot of fun, but um, it's their structure. Thank you. And then there's a post visit activity. We provide glossaries. We provide a bibliography of information that the teachers can use so that it's uh an experience

that really can be appreciated. We also devised this whole program to not only correspond with our exhibits, but also correspond with the curriculum. So K through three, we'd have one program, 456 is usually California history and world history. That would be another program. We get into

junior high. That's another program. And then when we get into high school, we actually are planning on using the high school students to do the programming for the youngest age group because they need to do community service. So it's gonna be a great program. It sounds

like a wonderful program. Now, the classrooms to the far left, tell me what you propose to do in the classrooms. Is this for the educational program with the Children? Or are there going to be extension classes? Say from UC Berkeley where they teach an anthropology class

or american art class. What are you going to do with classrooms? That sounds intriguing to uh you know, that is an opportunity for all of us right now because the far wing here is the third phase of our project to the uh, and um, so right

now, as far as the school groups that are coming in, we're working right in the building. I, we really are looking for community input and I think just the suggestions, you just made our fabulous as far as what we could be doing. I would like to

see that like art restoration. Uh wow, that's a great idea, something like that because now you have to go into san Francisco or a major city if you have a painting that you want to be restored and it would just be very, there's a lot you

could do and there's there's a need, but so it's open, it sounds like it's very open. Really. I I could not even think of one single solitary thing other than what you just suggested as what we could be putting up there, you know, museums today really

have to, as I've said 100 times so far during our interview is we really want to be part of the community. And so if you get into trouble, if you try to form too much of a program without uh interacting with folks just like you so

that we can really create it and make sure that it's what the community needs and wants. Yes, I think that um Sonoma County very much values their history. Most of the people here very much do value their history um and will be thrilled to have input

into it. So I could see where you're going to be doing some many media um interactions with the community perhaps through our local newspapers and and that type of thing, which would be really good I think for for the input Now how does one join the

museum? It's very easy. All you have to do is call the museum at 579 1500. Did I get my number right. Yes, I believe it's on the screen. So um and uh we'd be more than happy to have you become a member of the museum. We're

at a very, very dramatic and exciting phase. And so this really is the time to get in on the ground floor exact. And do you feel that the Sonoma County museum is going to be the museum for our county because I know Healdsburg has their little

museum um Sebastopol has their museum, Honorio has their historical museum. Sonoma. Sonoma has their museum. I believe Petaluma does all the little communities, outer cities do have their own museums, a good portion of them. Do you feel that this is really going to be like the

hub of the county for the museum and the history? Well, you know that is one thing I am a big believer in community museums because it's so important for people to really care about their hometown. And so I think it's very important for all of these

towns to have their own museum, the way Sonoma County Museum can really work in conjunction with these museums. Um I think um one of the examples I've, I've just had is for instance, we have a grant through the state of California uh to have events throughout

the county for our sesquicentennial. They didn't really want to give money to each one of the little museums. They rather felt that one museum should be kind of the coordinator. So that is exactly the role that I think the Sonoma County Museum can provide. In addition,

we can't tell that individual history of each important person that happened in each unit that provided some service in each community. So we'll provide that overview where then we can send people out into the communities to learn their own individual histories or to have our visitors

learn about each individual community. So I do see, see us to a certain degree being a hub and yet definitely not overpowering or over shadowing the individual efforts. I think this is an effort. You know, we just all want to work together. We want to provide

a service. When do you um do you know when these other new buildings are going to be constructed? Well, our main building with our brand new exhibits on Sonoma County history, that building is opening january 2nd. We might be taking a chance, but we'll have batteries

and water and everything from Y two K so, so in january january 2nd, the cafeteria and the gallery and the other sculpture garden, that sort of thing. We anticipate opening in 2001 to 2002 just depending on our funding and then the final wing, I'm thinking, you

know, I'd be making a guess, but I'm thinking too 4-2005, so that's the overall proposal. The big picture, the big picture, it's a lovely, lovely idea and quite a lot of work ahead of us now tell me about what events were running out of time, but

just very quickly the fundraisers and events so we can participate. Great, well actually this Friday night is art trails. This is a wonderful program um, towards the first of the year is really what we need to focus on. So anything you see in any of our

local papers aiming towards january 2nd, let's go, we'll see you there, we're out of time. Thank you so much for being with us. Thank you very much for having me. Thank you for joining us. I'll see you again next time. I'm dana do rico and this

is Sonoma County in the nineties.