Burke Museum's Closets Hiding Plenty Of Secrets

Science. Museums are the vehicles through which much of the public encounters matters scientific. In the Seattle area, that means museum goers are in line to get an enhanced view of science, as the museums here embark on ambitious plans to upgrade themselves.

One of Seattle's best-kept secrets is the basement of the Burke Museum on the University of Washington campus.

It is a natural-history treasure trove of an estimated 4 million artifacts the public never gets to see.

A Polynesian outrigger canoe leans against a hallway. Native American spears and harpoons jut upward from a packing box. Exquisite native baskets and carvings crowd dark shelves. Fabulous gems, including the third-largest topaz in the world and a pearl-surrounded opal nearly the size of a marble, sit in a drawer because of inadequate security to show them in public.

There is a fossil of a 50 million-year-old apple leaf from northeast Washington, the oldest in the world. Aboriginal fur clothing hangs from hangers, and mammoth and triceratops bones are heaped. Cabinets are stacked toward high ceilings and cardboard boxes overflow into hallways.

Quietly and with little fanfare, curators such as Sievert Rohwer, Peter Ward, John Rensberger and Julie Stein have been assembling an increasingly impressive array of preserved animals, fossils and archaeological and anthropological objects.

"Big collections are like enormous libraries," said museum director Karl Hutterer. Researchers come back to artifacts again and again with new research tools to determine their secrets.

The Burke has the largest collection of bird skeletons in the world. Beetles are used to eat the bones clean for preservation.

The museum has 70,000 insects and spiders, 38,000 mammals and 45,000 vertebrate fossils.

Total value of the collection has been estimated at more than half a billion dollars.

Shortage of display space

The problem? No exhibit room. The Burke Museum has only 16,000 square feet of exhibit space, one third that of the Pacific Science Center. The retail space in the Frederick & Nelson building downtown is more than 40 times as big.

Museum director Karl Hutterer, who took over the Burke in 1990, is launching a two-pronged program to remedy the situation. First, and due for completion in 1996, is a complete updating of the Burke's exhibits.

A new emphasis on the Pacific Rim, Washington state and the use of up-to-date computer technology will achieve a long-overdue modernization. Of the $5.2 million cost, $2.2 million has been provided by the state Legislature. A campaign is under way to get $1 million in federal grants and $2 million in private and corporate donations.

More ambitiously, Hutterer would like the Burke to break out of its quiet corner of the university campus and become the primary natural-history museum of the Pacific Northwest, constructing a new home about six times as large as the present one.

"My ambition is to build the major natural-history museum for the whole Northwest," Hutterer said. "We have totally outgrown our current building."

No site or price tag is in hand, but the Legislature has provided $200,000 to launch a study.

Other museums expanding

The modernization of the 109-year-old Burke is one of several changes at Puget Sound science and history museums.

-- The Pacific Science Center is winding up the first major remodeling it has done since the 1962 World's Fair. Windows and a new bus entrance have opened up the building on the Denny Avenue side where the Science Playground was. The newly enclosed wing moves the playground to the bottom floor and installs a new Tech Zone above that features robots, virtual-reality machines and personal computers. Opening date is March 5.

-- The Washington History Museum in Tacoma, near Stadium High School, broke ground Dec. 6 on a $7 million new home next to downtown Tacoma's Union Station, to be completed in summer 1996. The museum will include some geologic and aboriginal history as well as recent human history.

-- A $7.5 million Naval Undersea Museum at Keyport will reach completion this year, with its exhibits of torpedoes and submarines detailed in the Dec. 29 Seattle Times.

Also steadily improving are a marine science museum in Poulsbo, a whale museum in Friday Harbor, the Museum of Flight, American Indian museums near Poulsbo, Neah Bay and Toppenish, the Grays Harbor Historical Seaport in Aberdeen, and a number of regional history museums.

Too many museums?

Their varied ambitions raise the issue of whether Washington state already has one great museum fragmented into dozens of entities. Does it make sense to have both a Pacific Science Center and a Burke Natural History Museum in Seattle?

Hutterer argues it does. The Burke has traditionally concentrated on the natural world and artifacts and sciences such as biology, anthropology and paleontology. It is a research museum, sending expeditions to places such as Siberia to expand its collections.

The Science Center has focused on the technological world and sciences such as astronomy, physics and mathematics. It is a teaching museum, designed to introduce the public to scientific wonders.

There is inevitable overlap, however, and Hutterer wants the Burke to copy the Science Center's success at entertaining people, particularly kids. "We want to reach children," he said. "We want to get more visitors from the central Seattle area. We want to teach science, and teach how science is done."

Multicultural exhibit

The first improvement is scheduled to open in the fall of 1995 on the museum's ground floor. Called Pacific Voices, it will use computer terminals and displays to introduce visitors to the ethnic groups of the Pacific Rim, including American Indians, Asians and Polynesians.

Hutterer has assembled a panel of representatives from Seattle's multi-ethnic community, which is advising what the exhibit should contain.

A year later the second floor will be completely redone. The foyer will focus on the unique splendors of Washington state, while behind will be a volcano, glacier wall, and cliff-side exhibit of regional fossils. Banners, signs and a remodeled entrance will make the Burke more visible to those trying to find it.

This should allow some of the best the Burke has to offer to be better exhibited.

The basement will still be crowded, however, school class capacity will still be limited to about two classes at a time, and parking will still be tight.

Ultimately, Washington won't get to see much of the Burke basement until it finds a new home.