Museum of Discovery

Nan Selz, executive director of the Museum of Discovery, called the appeal of central Arkansas’ only children’s museum “multigenerational.”

“I think people see us as a family venue,” Selz said, adding that her grandchild introduced her to the facility before she worked there.

But there’s more than just the appeal of the museum that spans generations. Founded in 1927 as the Museum of Natural History & Antiquities, it is Little Rock’s oldest museum. A widowed journalist donated the museum to the city during the Great Depression to help educate Arkansans.

Eighty years later, the museum has the same mission, with a more interactive twist. The museum has incorporated science and technology. In a program called “Constructive Destruction,” children dismantle technological devices to learn how they operate. The museum offers 30 interactive programs on subjects such as electricity and the different forms of matter.

Selz said the museum has educators vet the programs to ensure they are “in sync” with state and national education frameworks. The Museum of Discovery is funded primarily through gifts, which account for 41 percent of its revenue. Fees for services and government funding account for 27 percent and 23 percent respectively. The remaining 9 percent trickles in from product sales and membership dues. The museum’s revenue has grown by 95 percent since 2005, from $1.72 million to $3.36 million. That includes, however, a 2006 grant from the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, which will pay out $7.34 million over five years to help start the Arkansas Discovery Network.

The establishment of the ADN has significantly contributed to the museum’s growth, Selz said. It includes seven museums in Arkansas that, according to the Museum of Discovery’s Web site, focus on making “hands-on, interactive museum experiences more accessible to the state’s 498,000 schoolchildren and their families.”

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