Should Seattle’s Klondike museum close? Just ask its visitors

ON A BLUSTERY mid-March weekend, at a beloved federal facility targeted for closure by the current administration, it was time to strike it rich with opinions.

At Seattle’s Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park, inside Pioneer Square’s restored Cadillac Hotel, I launched a poll.

My first prospect was a tall, bearded mountain of a man. Formerly a Lake Tahoe-area ranger, he was touring the Northwest. He shook his head, declining to identify himself. But as he watched a gold rush video, he seethed.

“Nothing I say would be printable,” he says. “If I told you what I really felt, it would ruin my vacation.”

No less passionate, others eagerly went on the record.

Theresa Lacey and Tom Calder of Redmond had just heard of the potential shuttering and made a beeline for downtown.

“It feels just like burning books,” Lacey says.

“If we don’t know about the past,” Calder adds, “we don’t know where we’ve been or where we’re going.”

Jason Hein, with daughter Vivian, said the museum provides a parallel lesson for today. In a dig at AI and its investors, he says of the gold rush, “For the vast majority seeking the mirage of promised wealth, it was a complete bust.”

The lessons also are generational, Vivian notes: “Kids can come here and see how their ancestors lived and see how the city they live in was built.”

Connie Wall and Dawn Walker, longtime Olympia pals and “national park geeks,” say between them they’ve visited 30-plus national parks. They took the possible closure personally.

“It threatens who we are as people,” Wall says.

“As Americans,” Walker chimes in.

Ex-rangers David Monroe and Jenny Dyste, who ferried across the Sound to visit, saluted the museum’s organizational context.

“The national parks,” Monroe says, “are the greatest thing America has done. It’s a gift to the people of the United States.”

Wiping away tears, Dyste adds, “It’s our shared history.”

Lifelong Northwesterners John and Sandi O’Donnell were making their first visit.

“I’m celebrating my 63rd birthday by buying a National Parks Senior Pass today,” John says.

Sandi lamented the “heartbreaking” prospect of closure. “This place is a national monument.”

Could I find supporters of closure? Try as I might, it just didn’t pan out.

Theresa Werlech of Mercer Island has worked as a tour guide for 35 of her 88 years. Escorting dozens of student choir members from Arizona, she summoned a hopeful analogy.

“This place is an absolute jewel,” she says. “I’d be devastated if it closed. Let’s hope that the Klondike continues to go in search of gold.”