— Montshire —
Expect the unexpected in this lab of nature
BY ARCHER MAYOR
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ANDREW WELLMAN
ow do you shop at a really great flea market? Or
take in all the action at an exciting three-ring circus? Your eyes keep moving from one attraction to another, the yearning to pause
battling with the desire to see more. This excitement is guaranteed to make you linger as long as possible, and to make you come back for
more. It is also an apt description of the Montshire Museum of Science, in Norwich, Vermont.
You won't get this impression by entering the museum's driveway, however, which is exactly its point. Located on 110 acres between Interstate 91 and the Connecticut River, right across the water from Hanover, New Hampshire (of Dartmouth College fame), the Montshire is almost invisible, with only its tower roof in
sight. In fact, once you round the curve, drive under the pedestrian bridge linking the museum to several miles of trails, and leave your
car, you discover that the parking lot and the actual building—modern, multileveled, eccentric—cover only five of those acres. All the
rest represent a biological factory floor of sorts, manufacturing a cornucopia of interesting things for scientists to study. Thus, if
the surrounding woods, meadows, and the river pose as the "plant," the museum itself must be seen as the lab.
And what a place it is. From the moment you open the wide front door, your senses are struck by two impressions: one visual, the other aural. In the lobby, directly before you, is a row of tall, fat, liquid-filled tubes, each glowing from a hidden spotlight beneath it. Each tube contains a different fluid, from water to oil to corn syrup and more, and each has a continuous string of large bubbles rising through it. The bubbles' different rates of ascension are a clear and instantly comprehensible demonstration of liquid viscosity. And you grasp that lesson over the span of three heartbeats. Right off the bat, you understand that somebody behind the scenes knows something about visual aids.
You also realize that what stopped you at the door isn't the only subversively educational eye-catcher—or even the best—because what grabs your attention next is the animated din of fellow visitors stimulated by what's happening just around the corner.
The Montshire Museum (named after the twin states it most caters to, Vermont and New Hampshire) is in large part a huge open space surrounded by an assortment of surprising nooks and crannies. Its center is dominated by a soaring hall, criss-crossed high overhead by wooden trusses and a tangle of intricate ductwork, and surrounded on the second floor by a four- sided balcony. With 130,000 visitors annually, the place is rarely shy of bodies, but it has so much to offer, and there are so many things to do, that even on a busy day there is no standing about or waiting in line. In fact, the floor plan is so open and free-flowing that it is sometimes difficult to stay put even if that's your intention. Every place you look, there's something beckoning you.
Interested in weather? Sound? Light? Boa constrictors? Astronomy? Fish? There are tanks of the latter, regular showings of the snakes, and an area called the Soda Fountain where volunteers work with visitors to make projects like the paper whirligigs that wobbled down from the balcony the last time I visited. The air is abuzz with concentrated excitement—parents and children, together and apart, sitting at or interacting with hands-on displays of a staggering variety. From blowing large soap bubbles to operating an earthquake model to watching fireflies in a small, darkened closet, the exhibits are designed to engage, entertain, and educate in a virtually effortless fashion. Visitors bustle from station to station with impressive attentiveness, and presumed sophisticates from the city—veterans of so many museums—candidly acknowledge their amazement at the Montshire's zeal and effectiveness. Even the elevator shaft was built with glass walls so you can see the mechanism.