Edu-tainment and the Museum: A Cautionary Tale

Nauticus is a huge battleship-coloured building, constructed as a metaphor for a ship, on the waterfront in Norfolk, Virginia. Opened in 1994 as an "urban theme park" — its theme being the sea and human maritime endeavour — it gained the title National Maritime Center, cost $50 million and projected attendance in the range of 800 000 visitors a year. There was much that was appealing: temporary exhibits featuring such things as Titanic artifacts, an award winning film "The Living Sea," virtual adventure games, a simulated battleship command post at the height of a battle, a number of interactive exhibits and the presence on site, on film and in publications of comic book hero "Captain Nauticus" and his "Ocean Force" who "explored and protected the Ocean." This was, seemingly, edu-tainment at its most sophisticated. But with success measured, almost exclusively for financial reasons, by attendance, Nauticus was soon in trouble. A high admission price, combined with a preference for tourist dollars over community involvement and support in an area full of other well established visitor attractions, soon meant that the economics were not working out. Nauticus essentially collapsed; "Captain Nauticus" went the way of his Director, whose theme park experience had not delivered the goods, that is, enough people through the gate, and the City of Norfolk was obliged to take over from the Board of Directors to make the institution an agency of the municipality.