Published February 2003

Children’s Museum raising funds for bigger home

Snohomish County Business Journal/JOHN WOLCOTT The Children’s Museum in Snohomish County, headed by Executive Director Nancy Johnson, is in the midst of a successful fund-raising campaign that will more than triple its space for interactive displays and activities. The architect’s rendering behind Johnson depicts the proposed building renovation.

By John Wolcott
SCBJ Editor

The Snohomish County Children’s Museum in Everett has made a significant impact on more than 100,000 children since it opened in Marysville in 1993. Now it’s poised to make a major impact on the redevelopment of Everett’s downtown core, attracting families, tourists and fresh revenue with its expanded facility.

A new location and a $4.5 million community investment will make it one of the Pacific Northwest’s top-ranked children’s museums, Executive Director Nancy Johnson said.

“Cities across the nation have found that children’s museums are one of the major attractions people ask about when they move — or consider moving — to an area,” Johnson said. “This will be a major benefit for Everett as well as for the children in communities throughout Snohomish County.”

Children’s museums benefit children by enriching their lives with information and experiences about the world, encouraging creative thinking and problem solving, inspiring a desire for lifelong learning and promoting relationships between children and adults. Teachers, family members and other adults generally participate with the children they bring to the museum, Johnson said, creating memorable experiences together.

Nationally, the Association of Children’s Museums lists more than 250 facilities serving more than 33 million visitors a year. The oldest children’s museum opened more than 100 years ago in Brooklyn.

For Snohomish County, the children’s museum provides an affordable, fun learning environment for families, school groups and youth-oriented organizations; a safe indoor environment for having fun; a supplement to augment schools’ education programs; and creative ways to portray the history and culture of county communities. More than half of the museum’s visitors come from outside of Everett.

From a business perspective, the museum contributes to the revitalization of the down-town area, helps to create future employees and employers who are imaginative and creative, attracts quality businesses and employees because the museum benefits the county’s quality-of-life image, and sends a message that the county is a family-friendly place, Johnson said.

Those messages have already touched many private and corporate donors to the museum’s $4.5 million capital fund drive for the renovation of the building located at the southeast corner of Hoyt Avenue and Wall Street, due to open as the new Children’s Museum in late 2004.

More than $3 million has been contributed since March 2002, including a $500,000 matching grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, $100,000 from the Tulalip Tribes, and more than $100,000 each from the Howarth Trust, retired Everett dentist William P. Brust and the state of Washington.

Community philanthropists John and Idamae Schack, who received the Everett Area Chamber of Commerce’s annual Henry M. Jackson Citizen of the Year award in January, contributed $1 million to enable the museum to buy the long-vacant Wall Street building for its new home.

The most recent large contribution came in January when the Boeing Co. added $150,000 to the museum’s fund drive. Boeing Community Relations Manager Tim Nowlis said Boeing made the contribution because the museum improves the quality of life for county residents and promotes economic development by attracting businesses that are looking for a culturally enriched environment. Nowlis said Boeing wants to see the museum grow and thrive, because “they have a real vision for the future.”

The aerospace giant’s support should make Johnson’s fund raising easier.

“The number-one question I hear when I approach businesses and corporations for grants is, ‘Where is Boeing’s support is all of this?’ “ Johnson said. “They really look closely at what Boeing’s doing.”

Boeing and many others who have contributed to the museum have been inspired by the grass-roots support for the museum. In 1993, citizens opened the Children’s Museum in Marysville, attracting more than 15,000 visitors that first year. When its leased space was sold, however, the museum was forced to find new quarters. In 1995, the city of Everett agreed to a temporary lease in the Culmback building at 3013 Colby Ave., the museum’s present location.

The small, 6,000-square-foot facility has been well used, crowded daily with children wanting to experience space programs, a Navy “ship” equipped and commissioned by supporters from Naval Station Everett, computer games, a model railroad, a children’s size cafe and an acting stage with a trunk full of costumes. But the wide range of pro-grams and growing attendance — 18,000 in 1998 and 32,000 in 2002 — inhibited some activities, forcing story time, for instance, to be held in a stairwell.

Attendance in the first year at the new facility is expected to reach 50,000 or more, Johnson said, since the tripled space will allow more activities for attracting crowds of children, parents and teachers. The site has enough space to accommodate up to 100,000 visitors a year, she said.

For more information, call 425-258-1006 or visit the museum’s Web site, www.childs-museum.org.

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