Strange times, weird places

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/04/2020 (1482 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Bad mews… er, news, for anybody who was planning a trip to the American Museum of the House Cat, located along U.S. Highway 441 near Sylva, N.C.

To help stem the spread of COVID-19, founder and head curator Dr. Harold Sims postponed the April 1 grand opening of the popular attraction’s new, more spacious lair, a converted house littered top to bottom with every kitty-related curio you can think of, including cat beer steins, cat jewelry, Sylvester the Cat comic books… even a mummified Egyptian feline that reportedly dates back more than 2,000 years.

“It’s truly a work of art,” Sims says of the 12-metre by 21-metre building with three-metre-high walls and a four-metre peak in the ceiling, which has painted clouds in a blue sky with cats depicted flying above visitors.

The 86 year old adds that the centrepiece of the space, which replaces a smaller version that opened in a nearby shopping mall in 2017, is a restored, antique merry-go-round outfitted with 600 lights and eight, two-metre-tall carousel cats carved out of wood.

“It is one of only two house cat museums in America…” he says.

Wait! There’s another one?

“…And one of only nine in the world, and has educated and entertained more than 18,000 visitors from around the world.”

Proceeds from the $7.50 admission fee (cats, and children under the age of six, get in free) help fund a local cat shelter, CatMan2.

While it’s currently impossible to visit the American Museum of the House Cat — “where everyday is Caturday” — in person, you can still get a sneak peek, thanks to the museum’s website.

That got us thinking.

Recently, a host of world-famous destinations such as New York’s Guggenheim Museum and Paris’ Musée d’Orsay began offering free, internet tours for anybody stuck at home practising social distancing. That’s all fine and good and interesting, but what if your taste in museums runs more toward the, um… peculiar?

For example, Croatia’s Museum of Bad Relationships boasts an axe used by a German woman to hack her cheating partner’s possessions to bits?

For readers whose interests might lean more to that sort of thing than old paintings, here’s a quick guide to some online museums that, like the American Museum of the House Cat, will never be accused of being mainstream.

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“World famous” Asphalt Museum

In 1990, Scott Gordon, then a graduate student at Colorado State University, was taking a cross-country trip with his girlfriend when they began to notice that most of the small towns they were passing through housed what he calls “funky little museums.”

As a joke, they began collecting samples of streets and highways they were driving over, using a screwdriver to pry up pieces of blacktop that had already sprung loose. The moment they got back to school, they put the various chunks on display in their faculty building along with a sign labelled “asphalt museum.”

“It was just a local thing until abut 1995 or 1996 when I wanted to learn how to make a webpage,” Gordon says when reached at his home near Sacramento State University, where he teaches computer science. “Almost immediately I was contacted by people from around the world thinking (the museum) was real. One woman brought her husband, who works in the asphalt industry, to visit on his birthday.”

The display, which presently boasts asphalt samples from six countries and 11 U.S. states, has been featured on TV and radio. It has also hit the road, so to speak, being temporarily housed at an international asphalt exhibit in Milan and following that, at Los Angeles Central Library.

“The Milan exhibit was amazing; you can see photos on my website,” Gordon says. “They were ecstatic to have it and said it was well-known among asphalt professionals. I couldn’t believe it.”

Visit the asphalt museum.

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Museum of Burnt Food

Deborah Henson-Conant is a Grammy-nominated musician referred to in some circles as the “Jimi Hendrix of the harp.” She’s also the brains behind the Burnt Food Museum, a virtual gallery that has been featured on The Food Network and ABC’s The View.

“I can’t remember how long ago (but) it started because I was slowly heating up apple cider when the phone rang, back in the old days when phones lived in their own rooms,” Henson-Conant says when reached at her home in Boston.

“I ran to answer it, only to hear from an unexpected friend; (I) became lost in conversation and an hour or so later, when I smelled something odd, went to the kitchen to it see it filled from the ceiling down with dense, black smoke.”

After turning the oven off and removing the pot from the element — the cider had turned to cinder, she says — she immediately fell in love with what she was staring at.

“It was so beautiful I put it on a decorative plate and a few days later made a plaque, giving it a name. As I inadvertently burned other things, I added them to the collection.”

“As I inadvertently burned other things, I added them to the collection.”–Deborah Henson-Conant

Through the years, almost every major food group — vegetables, meat, Pop-Tarts — has found its way into the museum, either through Henson-Conant’s forgetfulness in the kitchen or via donations such as a specimen labelled, “It might have been lasagna.”

As well, there’s an online gift shop hawking aprons and T-shirts marked, “I had a smokin’ good time at the Museum of Burnt Food.”

“What I love is how powerful a testament these things are to the power of art,” she says. “What turns a mistake into art? How can art and human imperfection join with humour to become inspiration? How do we know when we’ve done something wrong or created a new art form? As an artist and performer, these are important questions and the museum helped me explore them.”

Visit the Museum of Burnt Food.

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Toilet Seat Art Museum

“Don’t let your next event be crappy!”

That’s the cheeky motto at Barney Smith’s Toilet Seat Art Museum, located in The Colony, Texas.

Before he died in July 2019 at the age of 98, Smith, a master plumber, spent the better part of his life painting and decorating toilet seats, adorning individual ones with images of everything from Star Wars characters to wildlife to sports-team logos. Heck, there’s even a seat commemorating his and his wife’s 60th wedding anniversary. (Oh, honey! You really shouldn’t have!)

Smith opened the first incarnation of the museum in his home garage in 1992. In 2018, by which time his display numbered close to 1,400 seats, including a pair reportedly employed by Saddam Hussein and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (not at the same time), he was approached by the owner of a local bar and grill. If he was ever looking for a larger premises for his unique canvasses, they’d be happy to house the lot in a vacant building on their property, he was told.

Last June, a few weeks before his death, he cut the ribbon, welcoming visitors to the new digs, which, although it’s currently closed due to COVID-19, can be rented out for private functions.

“My wife said I promised I’d quit when I hit 500…. I, uh, just kept going. There’s no stopping me,” Smith told a reporter who attended the grand opening.

Visit the Toilet Seat Art Musuem.

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Moist Towelette Museum

J.B. Popplewell has a straightforward answer when asked why she felt the need to create an online museum devoted to moist towelettes.

“I started the website in 2002 after looking at other collectors’ sites,” Popplewell says when reached at home in Los Angeles. “I was quite unimpressed by the other online moist towelette museums and decided to build my own.”

So there.

“I was quite unimpressed by the other online moist towelette museums and decided to build my own.”–J.B. Popplewell

To date, Popplewell, a film producer, has posted front and back shots of thousands of moist towelette packets. The assortment is divided into categories: international (33 countries are currently represented); “by name” meaning the term moist towelette must appear somewhere on the packaging — the ones branded wet nap, wet wipe or moist wipe have a subsection of their own — and “other.” There you’ll find towelettes specifically designed to clean light bulbs, eyeglasses, printers and “dirty hineys.”

“People from across the U.S. and abroad have sent packages. Some of my favourites are when complete strangers email one moist towelette wrapped in a hand-written note telling the story of its origin,” Popplewell says, pointing out photos are not accepted for inclusion into the museum — the actual, unopened towelette is required.

“In the not too far future I’d love to do a coffee-table book, as moist towelettes really have changed the world and it’s good for people to understand how things are connected,” she continues. “And cleanliness seems especially germane these days.”

Visit the Moist Towelette Museum.

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Rune’s Barf Bag Collection

www.sicksack.com

In January, I was invited to speak before members of the Manitoba Antique Association. During my hour-long address, which touched on collectibles columns I’d penned through the years, I was asked out of all the collectors and collections I’ve profiled, which person or thing stood out the most. Hands-down I told them, it has to be a 2008 article I wrote touching on a Swedish fellow’s personal collection of air-sickness bags.

“The story is that in the ‘90s, people were making their own web pages and I wanted to start one of my own, too,” Rune Tapper told me at the time. “Most of the early sites I saw featured people’s cats or dogs, but since none of those were getting many hits, I decided I needed something odd to set myself apart.”

Well, readers will be pleased to know Tapper, a resident of Kumla, is still hard at it. And that his cache, the majority of which can be viewed online, now numbers more than 2,000 barf bags garnered from close to 600 airlines in 142 countries. (Canada is well-represented in both official languages; the paper sacks say also say “pour le mal de l’air” — “for the evil of the air.”

Besides a pictorial gallery and a Hall of Fame listing the names of people who’ve donated bags to Tapper’s cause, there’s also a section where visitors can share their air-sickness stories. Really.

“I don’t update my page that often, about once a year, but I definitely welcome visitors from Canada to my barf bag museum on the net,” he says when reached at home.

Visit Rune’s Barf Bag Collection.

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca