Spooktacular time at kids’ museum

The executive director said the museum is for the
Valley’s families.

By D.A. WILKINSON

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — “That’s beautiful,” Liz Nohra said to a child. “Your costume is beautiful.”

The executive director of the Children’s Museum of the Valley praised the child’s costume and others as the youngsters came to take part Saturday in the museum’s second Halloween Spooktacular.

This year, many of the regular exhibits were moved out to make way for the event. The not-for-profit museum at 139 E. Boardman St. has only 11,000 square-feet of space.

“It’s a small museum,” Nohra said. But it was packed with all the goodies needed for a fun and interesting time.

On the fun side, there was face painting and mask making.

Halloween videos played Bobby “Boris” Pickett’s 1962 Halloween song, “Monster Mash.” A life-size adult skeleton made of wood was stretched out in a coffin while holding a red flower.

There was an inflated plastic horse-drawn hearse, and lots of candy from the 15 nonprofit organization representatives who also passed out information on community programs.

Casey DeMitra of Youngstown brought her son, Ziere, to the museum for the first time. He was dressed as Spider-Man.

“This is nice,” she said of the museum.

The museum opened in 2003 as a result of an idea from the Junior League of Youngstown.

“This is for the our families in the Valley,” Nohra said.

Regular exhibits include one for children from newborns up to 3.

“When they interact, they learn,” Nohra said.

Rob Mies, a biologist with the Bat Zone at the Cranbrook Institute of Science in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., was the star of the show, sort of.

He brought live bats to the event.

One, he explained, is called a big brown bat that would be found locally.

The bat was actually quite small and covered only a small part of Mies’ hand. But, he said, that the bat’s name separated it from the smaller little brown bat.

He also showed a fruit bat from Africa, and a bigger fruit bat from Asia, that is among the largest bats on earth.

The three bats illustrate the good that the bats provide. The brown bat eats thousands of bugs a night that would otherwise bother people. The African bat eats fruit and, “spreads seeds all over the rain forest,” Mies said.

The Asian bat helps to pollinate crops such as bananas and mangos, he added.

And, he mentioned, no bats are blind.

For people who always wanted to pet a bat, but haven’t, Mies said, “If you close your eyes and touch the skin of your eyelids, that’s what a bat feels like.”

All the bats he brought, Mies added, were injured or somehow damaged. They are kept for the rest of their lives by the institute.

The biologist then went out onto a stage on blocked-off Boardman Street, and took out the big brown bat.

The children said in unison, “Aaahhh!”

wilkinson@vindy.coma