Washougal museum unveils ‘Pieces of History’ display

Two Rivers Heritage Museum’s newest exhibit portrays some of the most important and interesting moments and people in East Clark County history and highlights the museum’s authentic artifacts in a way they’ve never been highlighted before.

The museum will hold a public dedication ceremony for the “Pieces of History: An Artifacts Timeline” outdoor timeline exhibit, created by museum volunteers with the assistance of the Vancouver-based Clark County Historical Museum (CCHM), at 5 p.m. Friday, May 31, at Two Rivers Heritage Museum, 1 Durgan St., in Washougal.

“I grew up here in Camas-Washougal, so it’s fun for me to be able to see the county museum and Two Rivers be able to work together to pull this off,” said CCHM Executive director Brad Richardson. “Timelines are nice because they’re little entry points into interest. They hopefully engage people to want to know more about the story. I think it’s just really fun and pretty cool.”

CCHM’s public historian, Katie Bush, and Two Rivers Heritage Museum display committee members Karen and Richard Johnson and Gayle and Ivar Godtlibsen researched and selected the information for the exhibit, then identified objects from the Washougal museum’s archives to represent the timeline’s captions.

“The idea that was spawned by Brad, with his brilliance, was that you have an inventory, and people get to see some of that inventory, but they don’t pay attention to all of it, because it’s too much, and some of it is in the basement,” Richard Johnson said. “So what if you used the objects on a timeline? We went through (the inventory) over and over and over again, trying to make sure we had timeframes and objects that had interesting stories. Then we had to locate them, and that took months and months.”

“It was fun,” Karen Johnson added. “We found out things that we didn’t know, and looked in a lot of boxes and found a lot of stuff we didn’t know we had.”

The timeline was then brought to life by Masako Brachmann (graphic design), Kevin and Curtis Barber of Core Powersports, Missy Fant (photography), J2 Blueprinting (panel printing), Pepper Kim (editor/proofreader), John Kimbrough (timeline stand designer/fabricator), and Tommy Miller (installation), in addition to the Johnsons, the Godlibtsens, Richardson and Bush.

“It’s a lot different than ‘World War I, World War II, Korean (War),’ that kind of thing,” Richard Johnson said. “When people talk about timelines, usually that’s what they’re looking for, these moments of gigantic importance over decades or hundreds of years or whatever. But this is a little different. This is a story about these little objects and when they took place. It’s a continuum of progress as you go along.”

“We’re a heritage museum. We show how people lived,” Karen Johnson added. “It doesn’t have to have really a historical reference as much as a heritage reference. This is such a unique idea. It’s ours, and so personal to us, because (displays) artifacts, and the history is connected to them. It’s ‘pieces of history.’ That pretty much describes it. It’s not a total ‘everything that ever happened’ display.”

Richardson said the project “amplified and accentuated what both organizations bring to the table.”

“We do a lot of exhibits in our own gallery. This timeline is actually modeled after a timeline that we have in our gallery at the museum,” he said. “Our big focus, and the place where we’ve had a lot of opportunity to grow as an organization, is facilitating stakeholder relationships. Our methodology is that we want communities, organizations, and people from all across Clark County to be able to tell their own story, in their own words, on their own terms. We brought the logistical understanding (of how to put a timeline together), and Two Rivers brought the heart and soul of the actual story in history.”

“By (the time the project was approved by the board), we had some grant funds come through,” Richard Johnson said. “We knew we could afford the timeline. (Pre-pandemic), we were open three days a week and were doing OK; we had methods of filling the gap. Then we shut down for COVID, and as we climbed our way back out of it, there were a lot of pent-up nonprofit donations waiting, and they just started flowing again. Some were expanded quite a bit, and (Pluchos) was one of them.”

The timeline display represents the latest collaboration between the two museums, which have partnered during the past several years on a variety of projects, including historical arts and crafts displays at the Camas Library, tours of the Washougal Memorial Cemetery, and the digitization of thousands of Two Rivers Heritage Museum photographs, which were incorporated into Washington State University-Vancuver’s digital photo library.

“I think (our relationship with CCHM has) gotten a lot better,” Richard Johnson said. “We have a better understanding of their mission, our mission, and how to be interconnected. (Thanks to) Brad’s view of CCHM as an umbrella over the top of all of this, it’s undeniable that we will all be stronger if we follow that kind of lead.”

Richardson said that CCHM “100 percent wants to continue to support the work that Two Rivers is doing.”

“I think it’s really important for county museums to support municipal museums, defer to municipal museums, and, when we have an opportunity, provide resources and with the blessings that we have,” he said. “We think there’s a lot of really great future opportunities to keep telling stories out here. At the county museum, we’re 40,000 feet as much as possible, telling broad stories, but Two Rivers is able to tell granular, personal stories and connect with people in the Camas-Washougal area. It’s this really great collaborative partnership to be able to do that together.”

Two Rivers Heritage Museum is open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. every Saturday through the end of October. For more information, visit 2rhm.com.