Trail Center undergoes Christmas transformation

The Holiday Open House is McFelter’s debut in the Flagstaff Gallery. She joined the Interpretive Center staff as exhibit specialist in mid-September.

During a Friday visit to the Center on Flagstaff Hill east of Baker City, McFelter demonstrated how she has projected tumbleweed silhouettes onto the gallery wall and then traced over the outlines with chalk to produce the “unique trees.” Next, she’s spray painted the tumbleweeds white and attached them to the tree outlines to create a three-dimensional display.

Christmas ornaments made by South Baker fourth-graders and students from Keating Elementary and the Pine-Eagle School District at Halfway will adorn the trees. The paper decorations use recycled paper twisted and clipped into the shape of birds, balls and stars.

McFelter replaces Kelly Burns, who had been filling dual roles as park ranger and exhibit specialist for the past year while the center worked to hire a permanent employee to oversee the exhibits. Burns had served as the exhibit specialist for the past 10 years before moving into the park ranger job.

McFelter said she’s been preparing for this weekend’s big event for the past 2fi months.

“I started on a Tuesday and I had my first meeting for the Holiday Open House on a Wednesday,” she said.

The exhibit specialist earned a master’s degree in Museum Studies at the Berkeley, Calif., campus of John F. Kennedy University. She says she’s found her “dream job” along the Oregon Trail.

McFelter actually had been considering a career change when she learned she’d been hired for the position.

“I got my dream job after I was about to give up and become an accountant,” she said.

In 2008-09, McFelter was employed as a fundraiser with the San Francisco Museum and Historical Society, which is continuing its capital campaign to raise money to preserve the Old U.S. Mint, one of the oldest federal buildings on the West Coast.

“It was the wrong time for fundraising, so I took time off and went back to Yosemite, a place that feels like home to me,” she said.

McFelter had worked at the national park during summers in college and returned in 2007 and again in 2010-11 as a park ranger in Yosemite’s campgrounds.

She grew up at Modesto, Calif., and earned her undergraduate degree in art from Humboldt State University at Arcata, Calif.

Her other experience includes internships at the California Academy of Sciences, an aquarium and natural history museum in San Francisco; the Monterey Bay Aquarium; and at the Exploratorium, a museum of art, science and human perception in San Francisco.

McFelter, who is single, says she’s easily adapted to life in rural Northeastern Oregon.

“I like that I can walk anywhere and people are actually friendly,” she says. “They’re not when you live in the city.”

McFelter and the rest of the Interpretive Center staff and volunteers are looking forward to extending that spirit of friendliness and hospitality to visitors during Sunday’s special activities.

“This is our annual thank you to the community,” McFelter said of the Holiday Open House.

It will include food and drinks, musical performances and drawings for door prizes throughout the day.

Lessons on how to make the holiday decorations in the gallery will be offered to children and adults during the day and may be added to the ornaments already on the trees, which will remain on display through Jan. 1.

There also will be games for the youngsters. And visitors who bring nonperishable food items will receive a 20-percent discount at the gift shop.

Father Christmas will be on hand to review Christmas lists with the children from 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.

A free shuttle service to transport visitors to the event will leave Community Connection, 2810 Cedar St., at 1 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m.

“They’ll make three trips up and three trips back,” McFelter said.

In the year ahead, McFelter is looking forward to the “Pack Your Wagon” children’s exhibit, which helps visitors of all ages get a better understanding for the plight of the pioneers who had to cram as many of their belongings as possible into their wagons as they began the cross-country journey westward along the Oregon Trail.

Participants learn of the hardships the travelers endured and the heartbreaking decisions they were required to make to lighten their loads by dumping treasured possessions along the trail.

Another highlight of the Interpretive Center’s 2012 season will be the hosting of a traveling exhibit from the National Parks Service celebrating the 150th anniversary of the 1862 Homestead Act, McFelter said. The exhibit will be on display at the Center from June through Labor Day.

“I’m happy to be here in Baker and I’m looking forward to the exciting new projects at NHOTIC for the coming year,” she said.