Sports Museum Appeals To Fans, Non-Fans Alike
BY VICTORIA CHU

Although millions of Americans loyally follow their favorite team's games and worship the grounds athletes run on, there are still millions more who can neither throw a baseball nor recall who won the Super Bowl last year. Luckily, the Sports Museum of America, located at 26 Broadway near Bowling Green in Lower Manhattan, caters to all types of Americans. "It was designed for the nonsports fan," said Public Relations Manager Ted Leshinski.

With eye-catching bright colors and lights, this new museum, which opened in May 2008, is already attracting visitors, including tourists from across the nation and the world as well as New York City natives. Increasing numbers of people visit each week, and the museum aims to attract 50,000 to 75,000 people this year. The museum houses many artifacts, including the prized Heisman Trophy, a prestigious award given to the best college football player. This coming December the first of many annual Heisman award presentations at the museum will be scheduled. The museum also contains the American flag goalie Jim Craig wore around his shoulders at the Miracle on Ice in 1980—an artifact related to both America's sports history and political history. "People don't realize how much sports are a part of American culture," Leshinski said.

The founder of the museum, Philip Schwalb, first came up with the idea of an allsports museum when he visited the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in September 2001. One day later, the attacks on the World Trade Center convinced Schwalb to follow through with the project in an effort to revitalize Lower Manhattan. The Sports Museum is among the 12 out of 300 businesses that were granted permission to open during the revitalization, and the Sports Museum is the only cultural center. Seven years and more than $90 million later, both fanatics and those who barely know one sport from another of all ages can enjoy and appreciate the 19 galleries filled with more than 20 movies and videos, 600 artifacts and 1,100 photographs.

One of the first things visitors notice about the museum is how interactive it is. Powered by Cisco Technology, the museum offers many exciting experiences throughout its exhibits. An exhibit dedicated exclusively to Cisco showcases the "Stadium of the Future", in which visitors can explore the numerous options that will be available at stadiums in the coming years, such as phones that can be used to purchase electronic tickets and view the game up close. Other notable interactive experiences include "A Goalie's Eye View", masks with cameras that show what a goalie sees during a hockey game, including pucks that seem to fly towards a goalie's mask at the speed of light, and an exhibit dedicated to race car driving that includes Jimmie Johnson's No. 48 Chevy, bricks from the "Brickyard", the track where the Indy 500 is raced, and movie screens on either side where an actual race track is shown. To complete the mood, visitors hear cars revving and the ground vibrates as if cars are rumbling past.

Visitors will feel as if they are traveling from one sports venue to another as they stroll on through the galleries. They can sit in the Immersion Theater, which provides a 180- degree view of sports over the years. They can feel the weight of a javelin or shot put, compare the bats of Alex Rodriguez and Ichiro Suzuki and touch the golf clubs use by old pros. They can pretend they're at a real baseball game at an exhibit that features a realistic view from home plate and background sounds of a crowd that goes wild over a home run. One device has captured some of the greatest moments in baseball, making it possible to watch Kirk Gibson, despite injured legs, smack a backdoor slider at the 1988 World Series over and over again.

Besides having many hands-on activities, the museum also exhibits many athletes' personal belongings. "[This museum] is not just about stats, it's more personal, about the players," Leshinski said. The "Olympics: When the World Comes Together" gallery highlights the Olympians themselves, including their costumes, while another exhibit even contains the sports bra soccer player Brandi Chastain revealed when she ripped off her jersey and fell to her knees at the 1999 Women's World Cup. Another exhibit, "Breaking Barriers", is dedicated to athletes who crossed racial and gender lines such as Jesse Owens and Fritz Pollard. The Billie Jean King International Women's Center, the first of its kind, honors female athletes.

The museum honors everyday people as well. "SportsNation: Where Everybody Plays" celebrates fishing, cycling, boxing, lacrosse and other sports, and is the first museum to include the X Games. Meanwhile, the "Fan Culture" gallery allows fans to broadcast old games in "The Press Box".

The last exhibit before the exit, the "Hall of Halls", offers information about the museum's many sponsors, including more than 50 Halls of Fame and other sports museums and organizations. The museum's artifacts are all on loan from its partners and the private collections of athletes. The museum intends to add more items on exhibit as the years pass and history is made every day. The Sports Museum of America is well worth a visit, proving sports mean much more than just a form of recreation. They are a backdrop to America's history, an essential part of this nation's culture.