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By THERESA WILLINGHAM
Published February 4, 2005
Coordinates: 225 S Franklin St., Tampa; 813 228-0097; www.tampabayhistorycenter.org The Center is open Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and closed Sunday, Monday and holidays. Admission is free, but donations are accepted.
The scoop: The History Center is the repository for our bay area heritage. The center educates and helps us preserve historical artifacts and documents through extensive exhibits, programs and research. Gallery exhibits illustrate 12,000 years of Tampa Bay area history.
From Tampa or St. Petersburg, take I-275 to the downtown Tampa area and exit at Ashley Drive (exit 44). Stay on Ashley to the end. TBHC is in the Convention Center Annex in downtown Tampa.
Why go? The center provides pure, unmitigated Tampa history and culture, and is home to a rich collection of items you'll see nowhere else in Tampa.
Time stamp: We went on a bustling Friday afternoon. There was a big event going on at the convention center next door and Tampa was animated with pedestrians and cars, providing a busy, cosmopolitan background for our journey back in time.
Field report: History is always a tough sell to kids. But browsing the displays at the History Center is like going on a treasure hunt. Perhaps because of the diminutive size of the center (larger quarters are being planned), displays are innovatively arrayed among a series of giant cabinets, drawers and enormous pull-out cases. Each holds a historical surprise. There's a drawer filled with relics of 19th-century Ybor City: wooden cigar boxes, post cards, photos. Then there's a montage of World War II memorabilia, with personal letters, weaponry and medals.
Other pullouts contain uniforms and period clothing, and a room in the back highlights Native American history and artifacts. One display creatively employs old cigar boxes as lidded frames, inside each of which is an old photo depicting a particular aspect of Tampa Bay history.
The centerpiece of the place is a cracker cabin, featuring an anachronistic pair of computers on which kids can play an instructive history game and enjoy other interactive features. Friendly and informative staff guided our visit without prompting.
Upon further review: The Tampa Bay History Center is an understated treasure. It provides a wealth of resources and programming and houses an extensive library of books, maps, files and documents, as well as artifacts. Its quarters are clearly too small, and it's difficult to fully appreciate some portions of the collections on display because of poor lighting or inadequate display space. What's not hard to appreciate is the depth and breadth of the collection and the care that goes into preserving it.
Do it again? An ongoing series of workshops, lectures, presentations and rotating and traveling exhibits will keep the History Center on my agenda. A far larger facility that will be part of the new downtown Cultural Arts District will give the Tampa Bay History Center the more robust physical presence it deserves.
[Last modified January 28, 2005, 14:29:04]
| by Migdalia | 02/08/05 11:06 AM |
| Ms. Willingham has such a flare with words that you can actually see yourself with her at the place she is describing. Fascinating | |
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