Located in Moscow, Idaho off of West Pullman Road, the Appaloosa Museum has an interesting architectural appearance to it; shaped like a dome with a futuristic undertone, it has three iron horse structures located by the front doors. When you walk through the front doors, there is a large plaque immediately on the wall to the right, reading: “It only lasts a moment, but while it lasts it’s the greatest game there is.”
Setting the tone for the rest of the museum, it gives the viewer a context with which to understand the history of the Appaloosa and of the training and competitive riding game itself. The museum is organized into these two distinct categories: the history of the horse itself, and the history of competitive riding throughout the Heritage Center. Located online is the mission of the museum, stating: “The museum is a non-profit organization established in 1975 to collect, preserve, study, and exhibit objects and information that illustrate the history of the Appaloosa horse.”
As I began walking through the exhibits, I noticed that the exhibits didn’t follow a specific or organized pattern, making it somewhat difficult to choose which exhibits to look at first, since everything on one end of the museum was in a chronological order. One common artifact emerging throughout the museum was the use of saddles; many saddles used by the Nez Perce Indians were put on display, as they were a culture that relied heavily on the Appaloosa horse for support and travel.
The exhibit I chose to focus on was titled, “The Appaloosa in Advertising.” This exhibit was a large glass box filled with various household products that featured the Appaloosa horse. Ranging from food stuffs like horse-shaped pasta noodles, hot sauce, and jam to children’s games and cleaning supplies. Overall, I found this exhibit, while interesting, to be extremely comical and unnecessary. The only thing this exhibit did was express that at some point, the appaloosa horse was a semi-popular icon to children. Then again, so are all sorts of barnyard animals; the appaloosa in this respect is not very unique. So while I was intrigued by the exhibit, I found it to be unimportant due to the fact that children don’t tend to prefer one barnyard animal over another, although the kiddy section of the museum would be more successful in capturing the attention of young kids. Overall, it seemed to be more of a kooky add-on to the museum rather than a serious exhibit warranting genuine interest.
After my visit, I visited the museum website, which had a link to a slide-show featuring some of the exhibits. I didn’t notice the “Appaloosa in Advertising” exhibit in the web-site leading me to believe even the museum didn’t take the exhibit seriously either. This one exhibit shouldn’t deter anyone from visiting the museum, however, because the other artifacts and exhibits within it are very intriguing and educational. My decision to analyze the “Advertising” exhibit was based on the fact that it didn’t seem to fit within the wider scope of the museum itself.
As for the museum staff, while they were friendly and courteous, were largely unengaged with the visitors. Most museums I’ve been to have a very friendly staff excited to give a tour of the museum they work for; the Appaloosa museum was not that charming in this respect, although it did give the viewer a chance to look through the museum’s artifacts by themselves so that they may draw their own conclusions. Still, I would have liked to see a more passionate staff to get me excited about the material. On the whole though, this museum was filled with interesting and enlightening information about the importance of the Appaloosa to Indian culture. The website for the Appaloosa Museum and Heritage Center is:
http://www.appaloosamuseum.org/cms/default.asp?contentID=1
