Story by Christine

Tibbetts

Photos by G. W. Tibbetts

tibbetts1@bellsouth.net



Been there, done that doesn’t always ring true when you’re considering a vacation, or even a day trip.

Two November days in a small city I’ve known for 30 years showed me so much impressive change that I guess from now on I’d better retrace my steps to other places I’ve been instead of dreaming about new destinations.

Albany, Ga., is 40 miles from my house and light years from what I thought I knew about it.

Much of the credit goes to outstanding new facilities with plenty of hands-on opportunities for visitors. Somebody from this population of 85,000 figured out how to raise money and spend it wisely.

How about a planetarium so fine only three have been made? This one opens Dec. 6, the second one might light up by New Year’s at Yale University and the third doesn’t have a buyer yet. Sounds cutting edge to me for a small city located on a river, but not an interstate.

Attached to the planetarium is a brand new Science Museum which geologist and resident historian Stephen Syfrett says “expands exponentially our science-teaching capabilities.”

This is rural Georgia, a town historically surrounded by plantations—seven of them local folks like to say. That means you get a broad look at lush fields, promising crops and agricultural technology any way you approach, and then a fascinating close-up look at history, science, wildlife and some fine music all over town.

The new Wetherbee Planetarium symbolizes more than the night sky. With a high definition system made by the Spitz Company, which creates optical equipment for Disney, Universal Studios, Imax and international destinations, the Albany planetarium offers the latest technology, according to director Tommy Gregors.

“We’ll be limited only by creativity and budget,” he says, “because of the options of this high definition, fully integrated technology.

“We can show the real-time sky, turn the sun off and show you the starry sky by day, or order up the sky on any date.”

Albany has had a planetarium and history museum for years, but Gregors says this new dome doubled the size and tripled the pixels for clearer views as well as claiming cutting edge technology for big domes.

And I thought it was a little town with little ideas. Changed my mind seeing their reach for the stars, but would have changed it already had I listened first to the Freedom Singers at the just-opening Civil Rights Institute.

You might have read about it in the New York Times the day after the presidential election. Small but powerful, a community story of enduring national importance.

Icons of the civil rights movement draw travelers to specific locations: the Mall in Washington where Dr. King delivered the “I Have a Dream” speech. Churches in Atlanta and Birmingham where preaching and prior violence carry strong messages. The Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma and lunch counters in many towns.

What’s extraordinary about this new museum and institute for anybody who visits is the context of community

This is the story of the Albany civil rights movement in the 1960s, with faces and voices and personal stories. Simultaneously, it is the story of America.

The special thing here is you’re likely to meet some of the historic figures whose personal stories are told in the exhibits. They’ll be in the church next door and across the street, downtown in the coffee shop, community theater and art museum, pushing a stroller or biking the three-mile paved walkway along the Flint River.

If you can choose any time to go, start with the second Saturday of any month at 1:00 p.m.

Rutha Harris will be singing the songs of the movement with the eight-member Freedom Singers in Mount Zion Church. She’s an original, one of the four singers who traveled by her count more than 50,000 miles up and down the East Coast in the early 1960s, sharing a message of freedom and raising funds for the cause.

“I believe without the music, the movement would not have happened,” Harris says. She sings those songs today with a contagious smile, and tears.

“No I’m not sad; today is a better day. The tears are the remembering” she says, “the thinking about what you went through that you shouldn’t have had to do.”

Meeting Harris put me face-to-face with a woman sent to jail for what she believed when she was 21. That gave me new context in the museum exhibits.

Many powerful connections clearly will be available to claim when the official opening of the Albany Movement Civil Rights Institute takes place. A preliminary opening tested the waters but final parking lot details are expected to be in place before the new year. Watch the web site.

I like it a lot when my holidays or day jaunts give new fullness to something I thought I already understood.

Sometimes in the new Albany that happens in a light and easy way too. Their notion of an aquarium is river life, not the ocean, since the Flint, Chattahoochee and Apalachicola rivers impact the region.

This story of watersheds and the Blue Hole Spring has welcomed visitors since 2004. The new piece is the aviary, a big enough outdoor space covered with such a light mesh that you forget you’re enclosed with the birds.

The birds are locals, sitting in bald cypress or magnolia trees, flitting from wax myrtle, Carolina jasmine and trumpet honeysuckle or perching on the water’s edge in the routine style of wading birds.

Exits and entries are fun here; for the river creatures you wind around the Blue Hole on a wide, not-too-steep sloping walkway.

For the aviary enter a sturdy glass door, through heavy plastic ceiling-to-floor fronds and then another set of doors.

Seems excessive but it’s easy to get the idea why once inside; these birds are friendly and quite likely to perch on your shoulder or zoom out the exit with you.

There’s more—new and old—all over town. Animals in a zoo that’s more like a walk in the woods than a fenced-in facility. Fresh fish prepared in distinctive ways. Just-ground coffee beans for straight-up drinking or immersion in mocha and caramel and frothy creams.

Art from permanent collections and visiting artists, with public sculpture around town. Theater, symphony and sports events too.

I’ll be returning.