Love of aviation launches teens' fight to reopen museum
VANCOUVER, Wash. – Two teenagers are pushing to preserve Pearson Air Museum, which was closed after a contract dispute between the city and the National Park Service.
Brother and sister Kaya and Kjer Galbraith are gathering momentum to reopen the museum through the community and the Internet.
Kaya's love for aviation soared after spending summers at the Pearson Air Museum camp and at 14 years old she just knows flying is for her.
"(I'll) probably go into the field of aviation, be a pilot, probably just for fun, or fly celebrities around – that would be fun," she said.
Her 16-year-old brother, Kjer, also wants to focus on flying and computers after working with a flight simulator.
"In school, they teach history, geography, math – this teaches life lessons. This gives you skills you need to get into the workforce," he said.
Both volunteered at the museum for three years until it suddenly closed last week.
"I was very sad about that," Kaya said.
Both say even though the museum is closed right now, they can still remember everything that was inside the building and said it was a real treasure.
To save those memories, Kaya created a paper petition while Kjer created an Internet one. They have roughly 500 signatures. They delivered some of the signatures to Sens. Maria Cantwell's and Patty Murray's offices, hoping to save something that's shaped who they are.
"This is our second home and for many other people, too," Kjer said.
Kaya said she's also tried to contact the president and vice president.
She also said they'll continue gathering signatures hoping to get as many as possible to show the community support.
U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler is also working to save the museum. On Thursday, she introduced a bill that would transfer ownership of it from the National Park Service to the city of Vancouver.
The bill is now before the House Committee on Natural Resources.
If you care about preservation of aviation history, community building, educating kids with relevant skills for the future and government fiscal constraint let your local leaders know. Information on how to constructively help can be found at: www.pearsonairmuseum.org/images/Stakeholder_Briefing_-_The_Future_of_Pearson_Air_Museum.pdf
Welcome to our government ,always screwing up a good thing
Here is a link to the petition mentioned in the news segment:Â http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/save-pearson-air-museum/Â
i didn't even know about this museum. open it back up. i want to go!
This is so damned s-a-d.! Â Â Y'know, we're always trying to get the kids to find worthwhile things to do; things that will get them OFF their computers, video games, and cell-phones, away from the TV, etc - and hopefully, learn something useful at the same time... And here, we have something that actually fills that need..! Â Â So what happens..? Â The adult bureaucrats shut it down, of course..!
Stay with it, kids..! Â I hope you can get some assistance from your elected officials to get this museum re-opened..!Â
Great effort Kjer &  kaya..... I hope you two are successful... PAM is a great place to visit.
Sure wish there were more teens like these two
I'd love to see the museum re-opened, and kudos to the Galbraith siblings for working to make it happen. But I want to hear more about why the museum was closed in the first place. The Park Service terminated the contract for the space because of the way the museum trust was using it. Is this bureaucratic overreach, or is the museum trust mismanaged? Not enough information here to answer that.Â
If it's just a problem with Federal bureaucracy, then fine, sign the property over to a private entity and re-open the museum. But if the way the museum was being run created problems, there are issues that need to be addressed before we can go on.
@Isaac RabinovitchThe thing is Isaac is that it's a bit of both. The Fort Vancouver National Trust has run the museum for the last 18 years as a sub partner to the City on behalf of the NPS. The NPS owns the museum and it's land. Over the last 5-6 months the NPS has been unhappy with how the Trust runs the museum and felt it was not following NPS regulations and Laws in how it treated the site, mainly the land surrounding it for outdoor events. Here's where the Trust has a point because their events had substantially less impact than the events the Fort holds regularly and felt they were being disproportionately singled out in regards to those regulations. The NPS felt otherwise and tried to renegotiate their contract in order to have them better comply to those Federal regulations. During these negotiations the Trust outright told the NPS that they were not a match for partnership and that it wasn't going to work and they would continue operations until their agreement ended in 2025. Following that admission though the NPS approached the City who holds the partnership contract with them for running the museum and they both signed a termination of that contract effectively releasing the Trust from management and turning it back over to the NPS. Let me reiterate, The City of Vancouver released the Museum. Stated in that termination agreement there is/was a 45 day transition period where the Trust and NPS would work in tandem keeping the museum open and moving management duties over to the NPS and allowing for 180 days for all property owned by the city and trust respectively to be relocated with the Museum open for operations the whole time. Much to everyone's surprise the Trust instead closed the doors and moved everything out hastily and reported that the NPS took over and kicked them out making it look like the NPS closed it due to a borderline hostile takeover. This is a debacle and could of been handled much differently but it was the Trusts decision to close the doors and not the NPS. You won't find this reported on but with some digging you can find the correspondence from both the Pierson Air Museum's site and NPS site. Ultimately what is at stake here isn't the Museum itself but the management of the Trust over it.
@Samuel Sampson @Isaac Rabinovitch The exhibits were given in trust or loaned to the TRUST due to the efforts of the people who work there. Those agreements were not made to the Park.  This is why the Trust moved their assets.  Those obligations of care of those items...some of them on contract and some of them a friendly hand shake.  Either way those items were handed over to the folks who have run that museum for 18 years. People who have earned this community's trust thru their walk.  I completely understand why they were moved not knowing the specific arrangements the Fort would make.  Nor could they guarantee access to those items and exhibits to the folks who entrusted the Trust after the Parks took over.  Also, you have to admit.... the different yard stick used for permit approval on their events is skewed at best.  Â
@Isaac Rabinovitch The only problem with the way the museum was being run was the lack of CONTROL that bureaucrats were able to assert over it.
Simply put, it got too popular. But you can't move it because the historical hangar itself is critical to the museum, so it would be like moving Fort Vancouver itself.
The best times at that museum where the Veterans' Day USO dances, when a big band would play WWII songs and the old veterans and Rosies would come out in their uniforms, and younger men and women would wear meticulously-detailed uniforms representing their fathers and grandfathers. You'd sit at long tables and the old ones would share stories, and it didn't matter how old they were, you'd see them out there cutting up the dance floor while the younger generations joined them or simply looked on in awe.
The Bureaucracy says you can't have a civil war display there showing Confederate militaria, because it's a US military park and Confederate stuff is prohibited.  Nevermind the Confederate militaria at Gettysburg, Shiloh, Manassas, Richmond and the ROBERT E. LEE quarters at Fort Monroe... (Trivia: Poe served there.)
It's about control. That's all.
Those two youngsters have it exactly right....... Both will go far in furthering their education, finding gainful employment and will serve as a stellar example of success! Good job parents.......
@Funky-Munky Yup because the kids have nothing to do with their success...
I want to do more than support the museum's inevitable reopening:
I want to crush the sort of arrogance and bureaucracy that caused this abortion in the first place. These people have gotten so high on their power that things like museums and the memorial to local airmen that was housed there aren't even pawns. Pawns have value.
@Playanekes Maybe you WANT to...but actually, you wont do anything.Â
@Ken Ling @Playanekes I've done enough for local museums to have earned four flights in two different B-17 bombers, among other things, and my grandfather's name was on a display at Pearson Air Museum. In fact I chatted with the docents under her wing at Evergreen yesterday and toured it again. You don't know what aviation is until you've sat in the nose of a Flying Fortress taking off out of PDX.
Your snarky, juvenile assessment of my possibilities is simply trivial.
Kjer and Kaya have been such a driving force at the Pearson Air Museum, and their parents should be extremely proud of the responsible, caring, and giving young people they have raised. It is a privilege to have the opportunity to work along side both of them, and the dedication they have for our museum makes us all proud citizens of Vancouver. Bless you both!Â
@Laureano Mier Thank you Laureano for all of your undying loyalty to the museum as well. We in Vancouver appreciate all you have done for the museum and this community. I for one hope to see your smiling face back doing what you do best. Educating Vancouver's residents and expanding the museum to the best of your ability.
This is a way cool story worthy of mention.Â
Two Very smart kids. They will go far.