Museum Hopes to Shed More Light on History

Dr. Cephas Bard’s medical equipment, complete with 19th century remedies. A saddle from the 1949 Ventura County Fair. A Prohibition-era flask of whiskey, labeled for medicinal use. A two-faced lamb, born on an Oxnard farm in 1928.

They are among thousands of county relics neatly arrayed on narrow shelves in the basement of the Ventura County Museum of History & Art.

Most of them rarely emerge for exhibit.

But officials say they will be able to put more of the past on display if a proposed expansion goes forward that would more than double the size of the 15,000-square-foot museum.

This fall, the 25-year-old museum will kick off a drive to raise the $4 million still needed to accomplish the $7-million renovation.

When it’s finished, the museum -- across the street from Mission San Buenaventura on Ventura’s Main Street -- will have added three galleries, two classrooms and a community meeting room. The library will double in size.

“We are so excited because ... we’re going to have double the amount of visitors, double the amount of school tours and have two to three times as much area to show off our historical objects and our art,” said Robin Woodworth, the museum’s director of development.

The precursor to the museum, the Society of Ventura County Pioneers, was formed in 1891.

Its collection grew exponentially in 1902 when Cephas Bard, the county’s first white doctor, died and left the society the curios and artifacts he had amassed over the years, many received in exchange for medical services.

The first museum, operated by the pioneer society, opened in 1913 in the basement of what is now Ventura City Hall. By 1977, when it moved into its present location on Main Street, the collection had become the Ventura County Historical Museum. Its name was changed in 1988 to reflect an added artistic focus.

Art and history mingle in the basement. Works by famed Ojai artist Beatrice Wood -- a tea set, a ceramic fish, a ceramic woman tucked in bed -- are carefully packed away around the corner from dozens of stuffed birds and several mammals.

Upstairs, the historical gallery includes artifacts from pre-Chumash days to the World War II era. Among the highlights are an 1851 cylinder organ, a 1910 touring car and a 1950 television set.

There is also a small gallery for rotating exhibits -- currently fabric art by local residents -- and an exhibition space for the George Stuart Historical Figures Collection, finely detailed, one-quarter life-size creations of everyone from Abraham Lincoln to Marie Antoinette.

About 65,000 people a year -- 5,000 of them schoolchildren -- visit the museum or view its outreach programs through docent visits to classrooms.

For the new building, architect David Martin of Los Angeles, whose grandfather designed Ventura’s City Hall, envisions outside walls made of rock from Ventura County’s waterways, lots of glass and a 40-foot-tall great hall.

Although Martin designed the great hall to be shorter than the mission’s bell tower, its roof with a skylight will still be a focal point, Woodworth said.

“If you are anywhere in the Ventura foothills and look down, it will have a soft glow in the evening,” she said.

Woodworth said the museum was not ready to release the names of renovation donors, but described them as “longtime friends of the museum and a major financial institution.”

Before the public fundraising drive begins, the proposal will go to the Ventura Planning Commission, said Tim Schiffer, executive director of the museum.

He doesn’t expect to run into any problems there, he said. The site stands on what was an orchard for the mission, and the foundation of the orchard wall should become visible as a result of the work.

Ventura City Councilman Neal Andrews said Friday that he liked what he had seen of the proposal.

“As a council, we’ve been strongly committed to fostering our cultural presence, especially in the downtown area,” he said.

The expansion, which could begin as early as next year and be completed by 2007, would cement the museum’s place in Ventura County, Schiffer said.

“With museums, you think of LACMA or the Metropolitan Museum [in New York] ... the ones that do the blockbuster shows. That’s a different kind of museum. We’re a local museum. We’re going in a different direction.”

That isn’t to say that the museum can’t hold its own. “Some of the things we do are world-class -- the George Stuart collection is world-class,” Schiffer said.

But with the renovation, it will become even more of a community resource than it is now. “Our idea is, it’s a center for all kinds of educational and cultural activities,” Schiffer said.

“It’s a gathering place.”