Free Little Museum ready for viewing along Capital City Path

By Alesia Mayfield, Eastside News

Little Free Library, meet Little Free Museum. The Little Free Library on the Capital City Bike Path at the Goodman Community Center has a new next-door neighbor.

The Little Free Museum is a scaled-down version of a 19th century history museum with taxidermy. The creator, Sarah Stankey, is a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Wisconsin, and she came up with the idea for the Little Free Museum during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic as a way to bring a museum to a free outdoor space.

Combine that with wanting to work with Goodman on a project — and the Little Free Museum was born. Goodman was a natural choice since Stankey is a neighborhood resident and she admires the work that the Center does.

Using her backgrounds in art, zoology and geology, Stankey constructed the meticulous, detailed diorama using paint, natural and man-made materials and objects. The Little Free Museum will have the little library aesthetic, but people will not be able to remove anything inside. There will be printed materials that they can take.

The first exhibit is about prairies and pollinators. Stankey wants to get folks excited about the natural prairies near Goodman.

When it was time to fund her idea, Stankey successfully applied for a Dane County Arts Grant, and GCC’s Amie Hoag wrote a letter of support for the grant. The grant covers 40% of the funding needed to build the museum. Stankey covers the rest.

Now that the Little Free Museum has made its debut, Stankey is so excited to get public response and build the next exhibit, which she hopes to switch out on a seasonal basis.

To find out how you can help, email Stankey at sarahstankey@gmail.com. For more information on the Little Free Museum, visit sarahjstankey.com/little-free-museum.