Idaho Museum of Natural History Celebrates 75th Anniversary
Museum Director Skip Lohse
Each week I have been highlighting the many ways that ISU’s students and faculty are engaged in a constant quest for new knowledge to make our world a better place. I begin each column by reminding you that research universities like ISU do much more than train the nation’s future workforce. They also create new knowledge—finding cures to diseases, inventing new technologies, developing a new understanding of how the world works.
The Idaho Museum of Natural History plays an important role in ISU’s academic mission. Not only does the museum perform an important public service by sponsoring exhibits of artifacts and other remnants of our past, but it also plays an important role as an active research center, where affiliated faculty attempt to unlock the many mysteries of the past.
There is plenty to be excited about at the museum today. It is host to more than half a million specimens and an extensive array of educational programs for children, teens and families. This is not something that happened overnight. It required decades of work by dedicated individuals who wanted to create something of wonder and discovery for generations to follow.
The Idaho Museum of Natural History is 75 years old this year. It was founded in 1934, 29 years before Idaho State University adopted its current name. It was established by a group of professors to collect, preserve and display specimens of Southeast Idaho’s cultural and natural heritage. When it first opened, it owned only about 5,000 objects, most of them donated by the Pocatello Chamber of Commerce and by faculty of the University, which was then known as the Southern branch of the University of Idaho.
In 1976 the museum found its permanent home on campus, and in 1977, the museum found its natural history focus and soon after became the official state museum of natural history. The museum still carries that mission today.
This year, the museum underwent a reorganization in order to enhance its scientific research capabilities and to respond to recommendations made by the American Association of Museums, the official body that accredits museums throughout the U.S.
Three prominent ISU researchers will help lead the museum to become an important center of scientific research. Anthropology professor Herb Maschner will head the museum’s new Anthropology Division. Geosciences professor Leif Tapanila will head the Geoscience Division. And biology professor Rick Williams will head the Herbarium and Life Sciences Division.
The main focus of the museum in the future will be important scientific research, and with that will come research funding to sustain the quality programs at the museum. The faculty affiliated with the museum will seek federal and state grants to further a number of projects sponsored by the museum.
Museum Director Skip Lohse is making plans to rejuvenate the museum’s Ray J. Davis Herbarium, which contains 60,000 mounted specimens along with several thousand unprocessed specimens. The Herbarium contains collections from throughout Idaho and has several research exchanges with agencies from all over the world. It also serves as a primary source of plant identification for many agencies and is a site for top-quality research.
This year the museum staff will begin the process of studying each collection the museum owns and assessing its importance for education and research. Some collections could be passed on to other entities, both within the university and to outside agencies, to help benefit research not currently being conducted by the museum.
A research-based museum might not sound exciting to the general public who visit a museum for an afternoon outing, but the benefits of the research are passed on to the typical museum-goer in the form of new exhibits that rotate and change more often. There will be more opportunities for public programming in the future as well.
If the current plan pans out, the Idaho Museum of Natural History will become a more active, vibrant museum, both for researchers and for the public. Although we are taking a new direction, it will remain a place of learning for everyone, from the children who visit to the researchers who contribute their knowledge and findings to its collections.
The Museum has a proud 75-year history, and it is embarking on another 75 years of serving the public and contributing to scientific knowledge.
Next week, I will highlight other academic work being done by ISU students and faculty. I think you will continue to be impressed.
Gary A. Olson