Hood River museum revives interest in carousel art
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HOOD RIVER, Ore. - A tiny sign - "International Museum of Carousel Art" - outside the old red-brick bank building is a modest introduction to what's said to be the world's largest collection of antique carousel figures.
Duane and Carol Perron, the museum's founders, own more than 700 carousel figures, a collection insured for $7 million.
Some of the most valuable pieces, including a wooden horse carved in Germany more than 100 years ago, are in secure storage - in what used to be the bank vault.
The museum opened in October 1999 when the Perrons moved their collection from a Portland warehouse to the Wells Fargo Bank building at Third Avenue and Oak Street in downtown Hood River.
"We still get a few long-time bank customers walking in to make deposits," Duane Perron said. "You can imagine how surprised they are to find out what's here now."
Not only horses
More than 150 carousel critters and accessories from the family collection are on display. The make-believe menagerie includes bejeweled horses, a zebra, tigers, lions, a deer, pigs, swans and a carved blue heron dated 1876.
"It's our life's work, our joy," Duane Perron said. The couple also owns eight working carousels spinning in shopping centers across the country.
Most of the pieces on display at the museum have been restored by the Perrons.
They borrowed money to buy the former bank building and formed a nonprofit corporation to operate and expand the museum.
"Some people suggested that we sell several of our carousel horses to pay for the building," he said. "I ask them: `How many of your children would you sell?' "
Instead, the Perrons began a campaign to pay off the museum's debt and raise $1 million to buy the building. Once that's accomplished, the family plans to donate $1 million worth of carousel art to the museum.
A fond memory of childhood
It all began about 25 years ago when Carol Perron asked her husband for a horse. Not your usual horse - a carousel horse.
"I thought it was kind of a silly idea," said Duane Perron, a retired Portland banker.
But the nostalgia came from when Carol was a youngster selling soft drinks in a park in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
"There was a carousel there," he said. "Carol has been in love with carousels ever since."
The Perrons revisited that Coeur d'Alene park a few years ago but the carousel of Carol's childhood was gone.
A park maintenance man directed them to a nearby warehouse.
"In the basement was a pile of broken (carousel) parts - heads, legs and other things," he said. They bought the discarded pieces for $5,000.
By the time the Perrons had reassembled all the pieces, they realized they had bought 44 complete merry-go-round animals.
"We had found our treasure," he said.
They returned to Portland and began reading about carousel history and the great carousel carvers, such as Gustav Dentzel and Charles I.D. Loof, who left Europe to create elegant carousels in the United States. The couple continued acquiring carousel figures until they had enough to start the International Museum of Carousel Art.
Genevieve Scholl, an art-history graduate of Portland State University and the museum's executive director, says antique carousels are a beautiful mixture of art and industry.
Sadly, Duane Perron said, most are now an endangered species. Most of the master carvers were put out of work by the Depression of the 1930s. There were 10,000 carousels across America just before the beginning of World War II. Now there are 140.
By his count, there are few traditional carousels still operating in the Pacific Northwest - one at Seattle's Westlake Mall, two in Portland, at the Jantzen Beach shopping center and at Oaks Park; one in Spokane, one in Bickleton (in Washington's Klickitat County), one in Republic (Ferry County), and another in Cottage Grove, Ore.
The Perrons continue to collect carousels.
"We're looking for a set about 55 feet in diameter with 60 figures," Duane Perron said. "I think I have a line on one."
Stanton H. Patty, a Vancouver, Wash., free-lance writer, is a former Seattle Times travel writer.