A Burbank Museum? : It’s no joke. The Gordon R. Howard Museum provides an impressive, insightful look into the city’s history.

A museum dedicated to the history of Burbank?

Sounds like a Johnny Carson-era monologue joke, but the newly refurbished Gordon R. Howard Museum operated by the Burbank Historical Society is an impressive display of civic pride, not to mention an enlightening look into the history not just of Burbank, but of California and even, if you want to get really philosophical, the American city of Anywhere, U.S.A.

1 p.m.: Enter through Mentzer House, a small Victorian residence built in 1887 by the Providencia Land, Water & Development Co., a partnership of speculators who founded Burbank that year and named it for David Burbank, a New Hampshire-born dentist. He came west at the age of 32 and had the foresight to buy a lot in the San Fernando Valley. He sold the land to the developers in 1886 and they, in turn, laid out a planned community of farms and residences that went on sale May 1, 1887.

Mentzer House was one of these early versions of tract houses and was moved here from its original location near Palm Avenue and 6th Street. All the rooms are decorated with authentic period furniture dating from the late 1800s to the 1930s.

Exit the kitchen onto a patio and follow the signs to the Gordon R. Howard Museum, named for the complex’s major benefactor. (You can also enter the museum off Lomita Street around the corner from Mentzer House.)

1:30 p.m.: In the foyer of the museum are several period-room displays decorated with furnishings and artifacts donated by Burbank residents--notably a parlor grand piano and a 1923 Edison phonograph.

1:45 p.m.: Go into the large room to your right as you enter the museum, filled with period automobiles and various business machines such as old typewriters and telephones. Highlights include a 1922 bus that was built in Burbank and a 1949 firetruck plus some 1930s luxury cars. 2:15 p.m.: Back to the foyer and upstairs via elevator. This room is mostly used for civic meetings, but it also houses a small gallery of paintings depicting early scenes of Burbank and Los Angeles. For camera buffs, there is a large display of antique photography equipment in the corner. On one wall hangs a 1918 quilt that was created as a benefit for the Red Cross. It is stitched with the names of 10-cent donors to the organization and was auctioned off for the charity, raising a then-magnificent sum of $150.

2:30 p.m.: Back downstairs to the salon, where mannequins model authentic period costumes and hairstyles. There’s also a case of antique dolls and other toys donated by Burbank residents.

2:45 to 4 p.m.: The main room of the museum is a treasure-trove of nostalgia, charting the emergence of Burbank, like many a bedroom community, from sleepy farming community to the home of jet-age industries and big-time movie studios.

There is a series of dioramas, which are described via a taped narration you can hear by picking up one of the circa-1920s phone earpieces and punching a button.

Other displays bring back memories of those old black-and-white educational films from civics class. Others can make you almost misty. Consider a 1918 birth register from the era of “Go west, young man”--and woman. Reading even just the first entries, parents’ birthplaces are listed as Kansas, Illinois, Virginia, Texas, Indiana, Ohio, Florida, Oklahoma and Scotland, all no doubt seeking a promised land in Southern California.

The entire back of this large room is devoted to a display donated and built by Lockheed chronicling the history of the aviation industry in Burbank.

Around the corner, a tribute to the movie and TV studios for which Burbank is most renowned. The Disney Studios display chronicles the history of videotaping and includes photos from the many NBC programs that were shot in Burbank--but no homage to Carson’s frequent, facetious references to its “beautiful downtown.”

At first glance, the section on the rise of the Burbank school system seems a dry subject, until you start really looking at the old photos, yearbooks, report cards and even a tattered McGuffey’s Reader. The serious, shining faces in those artful, black-and-white graduation pictures fairly epitomize the hopes and dreams of generations of suburbanites. And no wonder they had hopes. The Lockheed plant was booming, Burbank got its own airport, movie stars the whole world was watching worked just down the street, and a roast beef sandwich at the Wunder Dairy Bar was 10 cents.

WHERE AND WHEN

What: Gordon R. Howard Museum.

Location: 1015 W. Olive Ave. (just west of Victory Boulevard), Burbank.

Hours: 1 to 4 p.m. Sundays.

Price: Free; donations accepted.

Call: (818) 841-6333.