Interpretive Strategies

The Museum’s core message is that important life skills include knowing how to handle your money and being aware of what banks do with your money. The interpretive goal is to give the visitor financial literacy – the knowledge and tools to be able to navigate the intricate highways of purchasing, credit, savings, loans, and investing. This knowledge should help visitors to avoid taking a wrong turn and ending up losing their hard-earned money, and give them more self confidence in facing life decisions involving money. As the only museum of its kind in the state, it will attract people from a wide area.

This is accomplished through three learning objectives:

1. To show the evolution of means of exchange from bartering, to shells and beads, to silver & gold coins, to paper currency, to virtual currency.
2. To present the history of banking and illustrate how current banks, credit unions, and loan agencies work, and what regulations keep your money safe.
3. To use the early 20^th century Germantown Bank as an example to demonstrate how banks in the past were different from those of the present, both in the way money was handled and how the local bank worked to build trust, support communities, and nurture local businesses.

Interpretive approaches seek to create a fun and substantive educational experience through contextualizing familiar concepts and images of money in ways that deepen understanding of what it is and how it can be used; conveying the complexity of banking, saving, and investing; actively engaging visitors in the puzzling questions of what institutions to trust and how to invest their money; and inspiring reflection on the interactions of banks, communities, and the government.

Major interpretive techniques include:

• immersive environments created through set pieces, graphics, and multimedia,
• physical and media-based interactivity that encourages role play and discovery,
• original artifacts and images highlighting stories and monetary systems from the past,
• activities that involve math, evaluation, and identification,
• exploration of specific characters, regulations, and events that affected money, finance and banking, and
• engagement in visitor feedback and reflection

Design and Detailed Walkthrough  

The Museum is set inside a 1920’s masonry bank building with a walk-in steel box vault. The exhibition space is small, with a main floor area of 600 square-feet with the addition of two 6’x3’ alcoves on either side of the entrance, and the vault is 150 square-feet. The ceiling of the main area is 10 feet high. The walls contain waist-high to ceiling windows except for one area 10’ high x 12’ long. The design will take advantage of the high ceilings and natural light. The building has a handicap entrance on the side and a wheelchair-accessible restroom.

The Museum displays and interactive activities will all be real and hands-on, not virtual or dependent on internet connections or electronics. There will be some displays that involve using electricity – lights or voice recordings manipulated by buttons.

Entering the Museum

The entryway is designed to encourage visitors to wonder about money and banking by presenting questions that they may have – or that may be in the back of their minds, or that they may never have thought about. As a visitor enters through the front door, they will be greeted by a money tree – a sculpture created by a local artist with dollar bill leaves. Each leaf will display a question about money, banking, borrowing, etc. The green “leaves” will be interspersed with red “fruit” in the form of money symbols ($, ¢, £, %, +, -, €, ¥) for eye-catching contrast.

To create a sense of fun, there will be replicas of the “Bank Cat” scattered throughout the Museum – sometimes obvious and sometimes hidden. There was an actual cat that lived in this bank when it was in operation. This will be explained by a label on the tree, and the first bank cat will actually be up in the tree. Children will be encouraged to be on the look-out for the bank cat.

The visitor will be directed to the right and will see, since their eyes have already been directed upward by the tree, a long curving “ticker-tape” strip (50 feet long x 10 inches high) hanging from the ceiling that has a double timeline on it – one for the evolution of money in dark red, and one for the history of banking in dark green. This “ticker-tape” will guide visitors in an “S” pattern around two triangular pillars on either side of the center of the room.

Right Side – The Evolution of Money

Interpretive panels on the right pillar will describe the evolution of money and of American paper currency with text and images – Colonial British pounds sterling and tobacco; Continental Currency, Individual State currencies; gold-backed currency; silver-backed currency; federal currency; and also ask why is the factory that makes money called a “mint”?

The display case under the window will hold artifacts having to do with money – wampum, beads, coin sorter, gold bullion replica, coins from different countries, etc.

The wall to the left of the windows will have an interactive game consisting of a display of enlarged U.S. currency, front and back – $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100 – with names removed and with numbers on the faces, buildings, and symbols. Below will be a console with headphones and numbered buttons. The visitor will press a button corresponding to a number on a currency replica and the face, building, or symbol will be identified by voice.

The alcove to the right of the entrance will have a mock store that teaches the different means of exchange for acquiring a product or service. This provides role playing interaction that simulates real life and helps explain how the means of exchange influences the culture and lives of people. Between the alcove and the entrance will be a waist-high console with a real $20 bill and a counterfeit $20 bill backlighted to show the intricacies, watermarks, and woven-in strips that protect the bill from being forged. Next to the bills will be a pen used to detect counterfeits and a label explaining the use of specially formulated paper and ink in manufacturing paper money. Above the console will be an interpretive panel describing the U. S. Secret Service and its role in deterring and dealing with counterfeiters and forgeries.

Left Side – The History of Banking

Interpretive panels on the left pillar will describe the history of banking with text and images –the difference between banks, credit unions, and loan agencies; regulations that keep your money safe; why banks fail; famous people affecting our banking system – Alexander Hamilton, Franklin D. Roosevelt, etc.

The display cases under the window will contain artifacts that have to do with to do with banking – roller paper money printing machine, ticker tape machine, adding machine, money bags, alarm box, etc.

The wall space on the left will have a horizontal flowchart diagram (perhaps with lighted lines and pictures operated from a console below) showing what happens to your money once you deposit it in a bank.

The alcove to the left will have a mock bank where a “customer” can deposit money or apply for a loan. This provides role playing that simulates real life and helps explain interest rates, collateral, and the benefits and risks of different savings plans and investments.

On the wall between the alcove and the door, there will be an interpretive panel with a risk/benefit diagram on what to do with your money – hide it, bank checking account, bank savings, certificate of deposit, money market, or invest in stocks or bonds.

The Vault – The Historic Germantown Bank

On the outside of the vault, behind the door, will be a 1960’s television set converted to show a video with buttons below. This will show a clip from the well-known movie It’s a Wonderful Life of the scene of George Bailey trying to deal with a number of bank customers wanting their money. There will be earphones attached so the other visitors will not be distracted, but the earphones could be disconnected so a group could watch at the same time.

The exhibition inside the vault will be focused on the Germantown Bank. It will have panels describing the history of this bank, the interpersonal relationships between the bank managers and the customers, who the individual customers and businesses were, how the bank served the community, the bank’s investments, and why this bank was “too small to fail” during the Great Depression.

The original safe deposit boxes will also be in the vault and will be the location of an interactive game consisting of mathematical problems and codes. Visitors must first unlock a box with a safe deposit box key and a code to discover which numbered box it will unlock. That box will hold another key and code which will lead to another box – continuing for six times until the treasure (lollipops, chocolate coins, etc.) is found. There will be different sets of codes for different age groups or families.

The vault may also include colored counting sticks, simple adding machines, magnetic fraction pies, Dr. Eureka logic game, etc. for younger kids.

Take-Away

The division of the space into three sections will allow school classes to be split into smaller, more manageable groups.

An email questionnaire will be sent to all visitors after their visit to elicit responses about their experience in the Museum. This feedback will help Museum leadership and staff improve the exhibits and interpretation.

Museum Shop

• Counterfeit detection pens
• Coloring books
• Little coin banks with the Museum name and logo
• Green visors
• Games and puzzles
• Books