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It’s 12:15 p.m. on a Saturday. SPARK Museum of Electrical Invention has been open for more than an hour now, and in that time a handful of families have traipsed through the doors looking for weekend fun and educational adventure.
Where did the kids head first?
Naturally, they lined up at the many interactive exhibits in SPARK, getting ready to mash all the buttons.
If running a fun, family museum is to be a success, at least some of the credit must go to the invention and construction of brain-stimulating interactives that are sturdy enough to withstand the rigor of a thousand ungentle fingers.
“The simple ability to operate some sort of replica — if not the real thing — makes the rare and priceless original on display all the more appreciated, especially to the casual visitor,” says Tana Granack, SPARK Museum’s director of operations. “Visitors feel let down if they approach something they’ve heard about that doesn’t work or is out-of-order. We’re adding more interactives all the time. It’s a challenge, but people really respond and appreciate the immediate experience they get with an interactive.”
At SPARK, our durable lineup of interactive exhibits includes a number of crowd pleasers. Here are just a few:
- SPARK’s working replica of the Cooke-Wheatstone 5-needle telegraph, built by craftsmen in Europe, is one of the only faithful replicas of the gorgeous original telegraph. The telegraph has a unique way of registering received characters, and it truly is fascinating to watch it work. Unlike the Morse telegraph, which also was developed in 1837, the Cooke and Wheatstone telegraph used no codes. Instead, any of the 20 letters on the dial can be indicated by making two needles point to it. You’ve got to try it!
- There’s also an old Morse telegraph device, on which visitors can send a distress signal as if they’re inside the communications room on the Titanic (and even see the signal as its visual representation pulses around the room).
- Are you tone deaf or pitch perfect? SPARK has a device that tests your ability to reproduce audio tones. It’s harder than you might think!
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