NOT THAT YOU ASKED, OR ANYTHING, BUT HERES WHAT I THINK: The Bob Feller Museum in Van Meter, Iowa, is now closed for good. Most of the artifacts from arguably baseballs greatest-pitcher ever will be shipped out of town to Cleveland. Others will be sold. The beautiful museum building itself will be converted to a new city hall. Thats right. A government office building where people will line up to pay their water and sewer bills and get construction permits. Whoop-dee-doo. I spent 4.5 very formative years of my life growing up in Van Meter. I learned to play baseball on the same school fields Bob Feller did. Some of my greatest childhood memories are from my days in Van Meter, where I still have friends. In the past, every time Id go back to Iowa, Id always stop into the museum. I loved that place and still love the town. Right now, however, Im pretty disgusted with what just happened. The museum seemed to think it was enough to simply open its doors for business after Bob died. A few days a week and not at all in the winter. If they did any promotion, other than going to nearby once a year MLB team Fan Fests I never saw it. No ads in the local paper or on local TV. No email promotion. I think there may have been a tiny ad once or twice in The Iowan magazine, but nothing regular. They had a website that was pretty static. You could buy stuff on it, but not much on it beyond the inventory ever changed. I was a member of the museum for years and rarely heard from them. They relied virtually entirely on Bob Feller himself to drive traffic to the museum with personal appearances when he was alive, and as far as I can tell, had no plan - and had no clue - what to do when he inevitably died, which he did in December, 2010. Small town grudges that wouldnt die and festered for decades, held against Feller, who admittedly could be a bit prickly at times, limited local community support. Never mind that he never forgot his little farm community hometown and once gave it a brand spanking new community building big enough to hold community square dances in. The town later sold it. I dont think the board that ran the museum knew what it was doing. They dropped the ball, big time, in my view. As far as I can tell, the local community wasnt much help either. I understand that these kinds of museums are hard to operate and maintain. But this one didnt need to die. Located right off Interstate 80 and next to Des Moines with its 206,000 population and rapidly growing, bulging suburbs, I think this one could have survived with even a little bit of planning and effort. Nondescript miniature golf courses and hamburger shops have thrived on less. When the museums traffic dwindled and it began veering into trouble, there was no effort by the board that I am aware of to revitalize and save it. From the start they talked about the need to cut back its hours, how the end was near and floated possible shut-down scenarios. Nobody seemed to notice that one of the members of the board most involved in all this was an executive from the Cleveland Indians, Bobs lifetime, one and only, big league team, which the shut down plan now provides will inherit many of the baseball legends artifacts for their own exhibit. Seems a bit of a conflict of interest to me. Now Van Meter has lost a jewell of an attraction. City officials assure us his legacy will be kept alive at the new city hall. Right. Every time local residents stop by to pay their sewer bill or get a construction permit, theyll have a chance to remember Bob. I still love you, Van Meter, but this is not your finest hour. Thats what I think. Not that you asked or anything.
Posted on: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 17:16:38 +0000
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