Museum offers winter break fun

The International Women’s Air & Space Museum’s (IWASM) Aviation Education Center at Burke Lakefront Airport (BKL) in Cleveland will be open to the public Monday through Friday Dec. 20–Dec. 31. Admission is free to both the museum and the aviation education center. The museum will have two craft hours every day, at 11 am and 1 pm, for visitors to enjoy. The cost for the craft is $1 per child.

The center houses interactive exhibits designed to engage children in aviation education, officials said. The center provides programming to school groups during the week and is typically open to the public on Saturdays. Exhibits include the Aviation Career Corner, which focuses on careers in commercial aviation, and provides costumes and props for children to imagine themselves as pilots, flight attendants and air traffic controllers. The Kitty Hawk Time Machine allows visitors to step back in time and fly a Wright Glider simulator and dress up in period costume. The Aviation TouchWall provides kids with the opportunity to see and touch airplane parts. A computer station and children’s library offers museum guests plenty to do in the center.

Visitors to the museum can also enjoy 100 Ohio Women in Air & Space, a special exhibit scheduled to run through January 2, 2011. The exhibit has paid tribute to Ohio women who have made history in aviation and space as the museum celebrates the 100th anniversary of American women in flight.

The Aviation Education Center has been made possible because of the generous support of Burke Lakefront Airport, home of IWASM, which has provided space for the center and support from the airport management and staff, as well as Cuyahoga Arts & Culture and the Cleveland Foundation, officials said. The Aviation Education Center is named for long-time museum trustee, Joan Hrubec, a lifelong resident of Cleveland, who passed away in 2007. Hrubec was a pilot and air racer who became a trustee of the museum in 1976, when it was first incorporated. She was the museum’s director from 1998 to 2002.

For more information: IWASM.org