A national touring exhibit about the attack on Pearl Harbor is back on the William F. Laman Library's exhibition schedule for late this year with the support of the North Little Rock Visitors Bureau.
Bob Major, the Visitors Bureau's executive director, said last week that he saw a lost opportunity -- both for residents and for military tourism possibilities -- if the Laman Library had to miss out on displaying such a historic exhibit. The Visitors Bureau agreed to sponsor the exhibit, he said, and pay the $3,000 rental fee.
"I read in the newspaper about it being canceled, so I called and went by to see Mary Furlough, the [library's] acting director, and said I really think that would be a great one for the Visitors Bureau to sponsor, if you can get it back," Major said.
The library, hampered by financial problems because of outstanding loans, had announced in December that it was canceling the exhibit planned for Oct. 30-Dec. 7 as one of its cost-cutting moves. The library also reduced hours at the main library, 2801 Orange St., and at its Argenta Branch Library, 420 Main St., and laid off 11 staff members, as of Jan. 1.
North Little Rock's city government has since helped to restructure two library loans from late 2012 for the purchase and renovation of the former downtown post office building for the Argenta Branch Library. Changing the loans to interest-only, with no principal payments on the loans this year or next year, will save the library system $624,716 over the two-year period, Mayor Joe Smith has said.
The exhibit "Infamy: December 7, 1941" from the World World II Museum in New Orleans is described on the museum's website, nationalww2museum.org, as "a powerful photographic exhibit" of the Japanese attack on the U.S. naval base that led the United States to enter World War II. The exhibit features 62 photographic panels with integrated captions.
"We're excited about the opportunity to sponsor this exhibit," Major said. "Allowing the people here to see an exhibit about something that is such a great part of American history, the day of infamy. That would really be something that I think a lot of people would want to see. I wouldn't want to see that one be canceled.
"If the library hadn't been in the financial straits it's in, and we'd been made aware of the opportunity to sponsor the exhibit, I think we would have jumped on this one anyway. It's just a natural," he said.
The Visitors Bureau will tie in the exhibit with North Little Rock's Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum on the Arkansas River in downtown, Major said, which still plans to include a direct Pearl Harbor connection by year's end.
North Little Rock owns the Hoga, a tugboat that fought battleship fires at Pearl Harbor, but it remains in a shipyard at Mare Island near Vallejo, Calif. A Save the Hoga Committee, working through the museum, is still trying to raise funds to move the Hoga to the North Little Rock museum, an effort that's been hampered by both cost and transport requirements for the boat, which has been designated as a National Historic Landmark.
The city, under former Mayor Patrick Hays, began trying to acquire the Hoga from the Navy in 2002. The city gained the title in 2005, then took custody in August 2012.
"The Hoga is still a very distinct possibility for the museum," said Major, who is a museum board member. "I know it's been going on for a long time, but there really are some things underfoot to make it a reality.
"Even if it's not there, the tie-in between the [Infamy] exhibit and the Hoga and the USS Razorback seemed like a good fit for us to help bring people into North Little Rock and into the library and down to the maritime museum," he said.
The "Infamy" exhibit will be the last of five national touring displays scheduled to be at the Laman Library this year. The others originally had to be retained because contracts couldn't be canceled without the library forfeiting deposits.
However, the Mid-America Arts Alliance, which presents two of the exhibits, has agreed to fund "Spirited: Prohibition in America" to be on display June 16-Aug. 11 and "Step Right Up! Behind the Scenes of the Circus Big Top, 1890-1965," set for Sept. 1-Oct. 20, said Debra Wood, the library's exhibits and events manager.
The alliance's sponsorship will waive the rental and shipping costs of $2,000 for "Spirited" and $2,400 for "Step Right Up!" that would have been charged to the library, Wood said through city spokesman Nathan Hamilton. An $800 deposit on the circus exhibit will be the library's only cost, Wood added.
No national exhibits are scheduled this year at the Argenta branch.
Metro on 01/11/2015