By Kevin Eigelbach
NKyTribune reporter
A big investment in the small museum at Big Bone Lick State Historic Site appears to have paid off.
Amelia Hulth, park interpreter and interim park manager at Big Bone Lick State Park, recently talked with some visitors about the park’s bison herd (photos by Kevin Eigelbach)
As the Northern Kentucky Tribune previously reported in September 2017, the park in southern Boone County celebrated completion of a four-year, $200,000 renovation of the museum’s visitor center.
The renovation included reconfiguring the glass cases that tell the story of how the site came to be the home of so many fossils of prehistoric creatures. It also included the addition of a skeletal reconstruction of Harlan’s ground sloth, a huge Pleistocene mammal, the first remains of which were discovered at Big Bone Lick in the 1840s.
The investment has contributed to an increase of visitors to the park and park usage. In 2017, visits to the museum increased 129 percent from 2016, said Park Interpreter and Interim Manager Amelia Hulth.
The number of school groups making trips to the park also increased 27 percent, and total sales from campground, gift shop and other revenue increased by 25 percent, she said. Those trends have continued in the first part of this year, she added.
An organ remains on the second floor of the former Big Bone Methodist Church building, which officials want to convert into a classroom/events center
The initial phase of the renovation, the reconfiguring of the glass cases, was completed in May 2015. Since then, annual attendance has increased more than two and a half times.
It’s not just the renovations that have fueled attendance, however. In the summer of 2016, Answers in Genesis opened its Ark Encounter, where you will hear a story about the creation of the world that’s radically different from the story you’ll read about at Big Bone Lick.
Since then, Hulth said, the park has received an influx of campers who visit the Ark Encounter and the Creation Museum. The park is family-friendly, conveniently located between the two attractions, and offers amenities other local campgrounds don’t, she added.
The park also gets a big boost from campers whenever the Kentucky Speedway hosts a race, she said.
With the park bringing in more visitors, the Friends of Big Bone, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting and preserving the prehistory of the Boone County’s Big Bone Lick Valley, has been working with park staff on ideas to keep the momentum going.
Ed and Wannetta Hartman, from Wilmington, Ohio, look at an exhibit in the small museum inside the visitor center at Big Bone Like State Park during a recent visit.
The two big ideas are to build a bison viewing platform and a classroom/events center.
One of the park’s attractions is its real-live herd of bison, critters similar to the much larger versions that roamed the area many years ago. Visitors can see the herd about 90 percent of the time, Hulth said, but they might have to walk a ways to do so.
The idea is to build a viewing platform that would extend over the fence around the bison’s pasture. It would give visitors a better view, but also give park naturalists a place to talk with visitors about the herd, said Pat Fox, president of Friends of Big Bone.
The Kentucky Department of Parks has provided a rough design and a cost estimate of $187,000 for that project, she said.
As for the classroom/events center, the plan is to put that in the former Big Bone Methodist Church building, a two-story white building with green shutters just to the right of the park entrance.
Built in 1887, it’s one of only two buildings that remain from the former town of Big Bone, which once included a post office, general store, hotels and a bathhouse. The other remaining building is now Big Bone Gardens.
Tony Cardenuto, visiting Kentucky from Buffalo,New York, takes a look at the former Big Bone Methodist Church, which park officials would like to convert into a classroom/event center.
The bottom floor of the former church building housed a sanctuary for that would be perfect for events such as weddings, Hulth said. The upper floor, which officials believe might have housed an Independent Order of Oddfellows lodge, would make a good classroom space.
Such space would be great to have during the winter, when the only other indoor space to host and teach schoolchildren is the visitor’s center, Hulth said.
The church building offers one advantage in that the park already owns it. But it needs repairs, a new HVAC system, a second entrance and to be made handicapped accessible, and no one knows how much that will cost.
Fox is working with a member of the Boone County Historic Preservation Board to outline exactly what needs to be done to the building.
Once that’s finished, she said, she can ask the board to partner with the Friends of Big Bone on hiring someone to do a feasibility study and on raising funds for the project.
Money is the main obstacle to creating both the bison viewing area and the classroom/events center, she said. Once the Friends of Big Bone has the feasibility study for the building renovation and the cost estimate for the bison viewing area in hand, it can start raising funds, Fox said.
Friends of Big Bone partnered with the Cincinnati Museum Center’s exhibit team and park personnel to lead “Be Part of Something Mammoth,” the campaign that raised the money for the visitor center renovation.
People complain about giving money for such projects because they think the parks department should pay for them, Fox said, but the parks department simply doesn’t have the money. But it takes money to make money.
“The more we improve the park, the more we draw people there,” she said. “And people spend money.”
Contact the Northern Kentucky Tribune at news@nkytrib.com
