BURBANK : Historical Museum to Get a New Home

Burbank’s history has a new home, but the housewarming will have to wait another two months.

When the Gordon R. Howard Museum was closed for renovations four months ago, the Burbank Historical Society said they planned to open again in July, but minor problems and other delays have pushed back the opening to mid-September.

Major construction on the 3,600-square-foot addition to the museum is nearly complete, Mary Jane Strickland, founder and board member of the Burbank Historical Society, said Friday.

“It’ll be like you’re walking into a house,” Strickland predicted. Planned by a Warner Bros. space designer and set designers, the new addition will feature furniture, clothes and period pieces from the late 1800s and early 1900s, about the time that Burbank was being settled.

Visitors should be able to get a feel for life in those days, Strickland said. Planned storefront doors have been replaced with leaded glass fashioned to look like the entrance to a home.

She said the society is still looking for items to give the display a finished look, such as period vases, pillows, quilts, lamps, knickknacks, and rugs. Cases for antique clothes that the society has lacked room to display are being built now, she said.

The addition joins two halves of the museum, one building that stores antiques cars, a firetruck and other vehicles from the 1920s and 1930s, and another that includes displays on Burbank history and landmarks and on Lockheed Corp. aviation and the NBC television studios.

A centerpiece to the new addition will be a $23,000 bronze sculpture of Burbank pioneering businessman Ray Sence driving a team of 32 mules on a combine, based on a photo taken of him in the early 1900s. The 300-pound sculpture was finished a month ago but has not been installed yet.

An opening for members of the historical society is tentatively scheduled for Sept. 10, with an opening for the general public Sept. 12, Strickland said. The museum will be open Sundays from 1 to 4 p.m. and weekdays by appointment for tours of groups of 10 or more.