New programs at Wasilla museum

April 15, 2005

KATE GOLDEN/Frontiersman reporter

WASILLA - Perhaps no one has ever been farther from short-timer's syndrome than Wasilla museum registrar Tonya Cribb.

Cribb resigned Friday after running the Dorothy Page Museum for the last three years. But she's still gushing about her summer plans for the museum.

Two shows in the works:

€ "Alaska's Flag Tells its Story," coming the first week in May, curated by Harvard University curator India Spartz.

The flag design came from the brain of a Seward middle-school student in 1927.

Benny Benson wrote of his simple flag, "The blue field is for the Alaska sky and the forget-me-not, an Alaskan flower. The North Star is for the future, the most northerly in the union. The Dipper is for the Great Bear, symbolizing strenth (sic)."

Benson later worried about the spelling mistake, but the judges, who unanimously chose his design, overlooked it.

€ "Beadwork IV: The Beaded Figure," curated by Beadwork magazine, June 10-July 29. The exhibit features art by two Wasillans: Cheryl Lacy's "She Wore Fish-Net Stockings" and Connie Halverson's "Selkie the Seal Maiden."

Cribb noted that the Page Museum is the only Alaska venue to get the exhibit so far.

"If people want to see this bead show, they gotta come to Wasilla," Cribb said. "Yahoo."

€ "Wasilla Frontier Town," a new permanent exhibit Cribb has updated with a $7,000 grant from the state, tells the story of the town's development.

€ Native porcupine-quill and bead jewelry-making class, taught by curator of education June Pardue. May 16, 17, 23, 24, from 6-8 p.m. Cost is $50, plus materials.

€ Beading classes for kids and adults will continue throughout the summer.

€ From mid-June through the rest of the summer, the Wasilla-Knik Historical Society will sponsor a farmer's market Wednesdays from noon-6 p.m.

Last year, Cribb said, there were "jams that would knock your socks off."

For more information on what's happening at the museum, call 373-9071.