Update - Winter 2004 • Spring 2005

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Executive Director Selma Shapiro —“a True Tennessee Treasure”— to Retire December 31

The growth of the Children's Museum of Oak Ridge from its modest beginnings to the nationally renowned museum and cultural center it is today serves as a tribute to Selma Shapiro, the museum's first executive director who is retiring at age 80 at the end of this year.

Her roles have been plentiful beyond that of directing the museum. She has been grandmother to neighborhood youth, nurturer of artists and musicians, a historic preservationist, a teacher, a skilled grant writer, and a visionary who took hold of opportunities to weave the museum into the fabric of the community.

"She is the heart and soul of the Children's Museum, just absolutely from the beginning until now," said Frances Drake, museum board president. "She has been the most steady presence, the one who has kept it all going, and the one who had the vision."

The Children's Museum is a place of discovery and adventure for children of all ages, who may walk through a rain forest, dress up in grandma's attic, put on a play with puppets, build a train layout, learn to craft a clay pot or to design a mural, among many other activities. Teens and college students return to the museum where they once played to volunteer, to teach classes, taking responsibility for the next generation of children and giving back to the community in a place that nurtured them.

Selma began creating the atmosphere for all this to happen and more when she agreed to become executive director of a small museum in the library of the former Jefferson Junior High School in 1973.

Girl Scout Troop 69 received a $500 Readers Digest grant to start the museum. In 1974, when the school was razed, Selma and the museum moved to two rooms in the former Highland View Elementary School, the 54,000 square-foot building now filled with museum exhibits, collections, classrooms, and activities. "I think she will be an asset to the museum for the rest of her life," said Viola Ergen, who retired two years ago as business manager of the museum. "She has worked there seven days a week. The museum is her baby, and she wants to be sure that everything goes well with the museum." Selma plans to join Viola as a volunteer at the museum upon her retirement.

Viola worked with Selma from the museum's beginning. Even before it started, Viola was a troop leader of Girl Scouts who developed displays later used by Troop 69 in starting the museum. When Selma was hired, she planned the exhibits and Viola kept the books, but those weren't their only roles. "We cleaned the toilets, and we mopped the floors, and we painted cabinets. There wasn't anything that Selma and I didn't do," Viola recalled.

Selma's work on this grassroots Children's Museum brought appeals from other communities asking her how to start such a museum. Her involvement in the national museum movement contributed to the growth of children's museums across the country, Viola said.

Museum exhibit designer Peg Heddleson, also with Selma since the museum's beginnings, commended her ability to let staff and volunteers use their talents to accomplish creative and non-traditional exhibits and programs at the museum.

"She let us try things," Peg said. "First she made sure we knew her philosophy about how you treat the public, how you treat children."

Selma's work led her to join others in helping create a national Association of Children's Museums. It led her, in 1990, to the lawn of the White House, where First Lady Barbara Bush honored her and 11 others accepting grants from the Institute of Museum Services. But first, it led her to Highland View School, where she saw possibilities of delighting and educating children in an aging schoolhouse.

She was honored recently with a "Grandest Grandparent Award" by the Beck Cultural Center in Knoxville, recognizing her advocacy and support for children in the community. She has become a grandparent to many, taking children for doctor's visits, helping with homework, or serving as a counselor listening to the problems of a child.

It is only fitting that the traveling exhibit at the museum during her retirement focuses on the Hmong culture, one of many world and regional cultures that Selma has encouraged children and their families to learn more about. The culture of the southern Appalachian Mountains has been a focus of the museum since it began. A $378,000 grant in 1978 from the National Endowment for the Humanities-a tremendous grant that Selma won for her small museum-resulted in years of programs, projects, and literary works focused on Appalachia.

"Selma Shapiro is a true Tennessee treasure. She was a pioneer in integrating arts education into the curriculum of a children's museum program when others were only thinking about it. Selma saw the joy in the hearts of children as they could see and feel and interpret objects and how that increased their learning skills," said Rich Boyd, executive director of the Tennessee Arts Commission.

Boyd said the Commission has valued its partnership formed through the years with Selma and the museum. He noted that she received the first Gordon Holl Award for Outstanding Arts Administrator in 1982 in recognition of her work.

"The Commission wishes Selma Shapiro the very best as she begins a new journey in her rich and rewarding life," Boyd said. And so do all her children and friends at the Children's Museum of Oak Ridge.

Thank you, Selma, for a job well done.


Click to Read Update! Winter 2004 • Spring 2005 Newsletter

Museum Hosts Club's Birthday Party

The Children's Museum was the place to be for a recent birthday party for Chelsey Cox, a member of the museum's Homework Club for Highland View area neighborhood children. The Club offers help with school assignments and promotes better study habits for many neighborhood kids. Individual and group crafts, classes, and play opportunities and snacks also are offered.

At left, Homework Club children dance the Macarena at Chelsey's birthday party.