The North Iowa Children’s Museum, in conjunction with the Clear Lake Athletics and Wellness Center (CLAW), held the second “Meet a Machine” event on Saturday, June 8, in the CLAW parking lot. Many of last year’s favorite machines were joined by new ones such as Casey Schlichting’s USRA modified race car and the 2023 Rosenbauer Panther fire and rescue truck from the Mason City Municipal Airport. Kids also had a blast in the inflatable bounce house and giant sandbox. The Clear Lake High School Robotics Team was showcasing some of their creations, kids of all ages were flipping out over flipping tires and Mark Holt, of Varied Industries Corp., was leaving trails in the sky as he flew over the event.
The North Iowa Children’s Museum, a registered 501(c) (3) non-profit organization, has been providing experiential play exhibits and programs for children that stimulate exploration, learning, development and imagination since 2022. Their mobile, interactive, exhibits have been featured at community events such as Color the Wind, Thursdays on Main, Christmas by the Lake, Bash at the Lake, Farmer’s Markets and several parades. Currently the museum is mobile, but it is the hope and dream of the museum board to build a 20,000 square foot destination with hands-on exhibits right here in Clear Lake.
“This is my passion project,” said Lorena Malecha, founder and president of the North Iowa Children’s Museum. “We moved here three years ago now and I have three kids, [ages] six, four and one. I love Clear Lake, there’s a lot to do, but we were looking for an indoor destination and this fills that need.”
She said that Lincoln, Neb., where they were from, has a very large children’s museum and she felt that with Clear Lake’s tourist attractions, such as the lake and the Surf Ballroom, this would be the perfect place to locate one. So she gathered together a group of like-minded individuals and launched a capital campaign to raise the money.
Board member and director Ellen Pritchard Sedlock told the Clear Lake City Council last November that they have a donor who has committed to donating a plot of land for the museum in the Emerald Edge subdivision and they were almost ready to apply for a $1.3 million Community Attractions and Tourism (CAT) grant that would be a big help in getting the year-round children’s museum project complete. Sedlock asked the Council for a letter of Intent and council members later unanimously approved the city being a co-applicant on a future grant application with a financial contribution not to exceed $700,000.
Two council members, however, expressed some concerns about the sustainability of a children’s museum given the cost of the project and the limited population in North Iowa, therefore within the Letter of Intent is an agreed upon contingency that the Children’s Museum gets an independent feasibility study done.
ConsultEcon, the firm conducting the feasibility study, will be in Clear Lake June 11-12 to do on-site meetings with community stakeholders. “I think the feasibility study looks very promising,” Malecha said.
The North Iowa Children’s Museum has set a $5 million goal and still has a long way to go and would like to remind everyone that they are running a marathon, not a sprint and there may be plenty of challenges and obstacles still to come. If you are interested in donating to their endeavor, you can do so at www.northiowachildrensmuseum.org.
