Cartersville Museums

from Atlanta Intown - August 2022

To the Lighthouses

When They Run With Freedom artist Benjamin Jacob Nelson or Ahn-Hia-Ohm mixed media (Photo by Donna P. Williams)

Ranch, a hands-on experience and interactive children’s gallery.

“The museum has become an important attraction since opening in Cartersville, being the world’s largest permanent exhibition space for Western art, and it is the largest museum of its kind in the Southeast,” said Grace Adams, director of marketing at Booth Western Art Museum.

With 120,000 square feet of space, the Booth is a great size to see in a day, but offers more than enough to make additional trips worthwhile, Adams said. “Temporary exhibits are changed every three to four months in four

By Kathy Dean

The Tellus Science Museum building winks through a cluster of tall trees along I-75 near Exit 293. It hits the eye like the prow of a proud ship. The building hints at the treasures displayed within it, and other treasures in Cartersville, a city less than an hour’s drive north of Atlanta that has collected a cluster of unusual museums.

“Cartersville is home to … some of the Atlanta area’s most interesting museums,” said Meredith Dollevoet, sales and marketing manager at the CartersvilleBartow County Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Things really started, Dollevoet said, when a group of local business owners got together and decided they needed a place to show artworks they had gathered to the public. “The Booth Museum was opened in 2003 as a way to share their art collections with the community and to provide educational opportunities,” she said.

That was just the start. The group formed the non-profit Georgia Museums, Inc., and in 2009, opened the Tellus Science Museum as an expansion of a building then known as the Weinman Mineral Museum. Other museums followed, with Georgia Museums now responsible for the Bartow History Museum and a related entity that operates the Grand Theatre in downtown Cartersville.

The latest addition to the group’s collection, the Savoy Automobile Museum, opened in December 2021.

The gathering of museums draws tourists and attention to the city. In fact, Smithsonian Magazine included Cartersville as one of the 15 Best Small Towns to Visit in 2022.

“In a nutshell, Cartersville became Georgia’s Museum City because a group of generous businessmen wanted to give back to the community through their love and appreciation of art, history, science, education, and now, cars,” Dollevoet said.

Booth Western Art Museum

The Booth Museum, named for Sam Booth, a friend and mentor to the founders, boasts a permanent collection of the art of the American west, Civil War art and presidential portraits and letters, allowing visitors to “See America’s Story” in paintings, sculpture, photography and artifacts. The Booth also features Sagebrush

A 1955 Chevy Bel Air at the Savoy Automobile Museum.

Apollo I Replica, Credit Tellus Science Museum

galleries, resulting in 12 to 15 exhibitions per year, the most in any Georgia art museum,” she said.

For more, visit boothmusesum.org. Tellus Science Museum

The Tellus Science Museum is an expansion of the former Weinman Mineral Museum, according to Shelly Redd, Director of Marketing at the Tellus Science Museum.

“The Weinman Museum was one of the few options teachers had for geology field trips for students,” she said. “However, the 9,000-square-foot museum could not accommodate the high demand for educational activities. Eventually the museum was turning away more students than they were able to serve and that’s when the decision was made to expand the museum and the services we offer.” It has grown to 120,000 square feet with four permanent galleries: The Weinman Mineral Gallery, The Fossil Gallery, Science in Motion and The Collins Family My Big Backyard. Some of the most popular exhibits are an 80-foot-long Brontosaurus and a replica 1903 Wright flyer.

Tellus also houses three special exhibit galleries, a fossil dig, and gem-panning interactive exhibit, as well as a 120-seat digital planetarium and an observatory that features a state-of-the-art 20-inch telescope.

“The museum became a Smithsonian Affiliate shortly after opening in January 2009,” Redd added.

For more, visit tellusmuseum.org.

Savoy Automobile Museum

Inside the 65,000-square-foot Savoy Automobile Museum, visitors are invited to roam a Great Hall and four exhibition galleries that showcase automobiles of different makes, models, and eras. There is also a state-of-the-art theatre with stadium seating for nearly 300 guests that includes an ultra hi-definition video panel wall, measuring 17 feet by 33 feet, and a turntable stage for rotating vehicles. The museum’s permanent collection rotates periodically; it includes a 1932 Rolls Royce 20/25, 1953 Kaiser Dragon and 1957 Chevrolet Corvette.

The museum’s name seemed predetermined. “When developing the land, a 1954 Plymouth Savoy car with a tree growing out of it was unearthed. As if by fate, it was the only vehicle uncovered,” Dollevoet said. “This famous Savoy car is on permanent display outside the museum in all its rusted glory.”

The Savoy has a 37-acre campus, and there are plans to build an outdoor pavilion for use with events on the showgrounds. Current and upcoming exhibitions include: “Pirelli: The Story of a Company,” through Sept. 4, with a collection of cars that don Pirelli tires, including Formula One, Ferrari and Lamborghini; “FrontRunners,” through Oct. 2, featuring record-breaking Indy roadsters from the 1950s and 1960s; and “Big Blocks,” Aug. 2-Dec. 4, showcasing “the big and bold from an iconic era in American automotive history.”

In addition to exhibitions, the Savoy hosts events. On Aug. 13 at 2 p.m., the 1968 Steve McQueen film “Bullitt” will be shown at the Savoy’s theatre.

For details, visit savoymuseum.org.

Seth Hopkins

By Kathy Dean

Seth Hopkins, the Booth Museum’s first employee, helped the museum take root and flourish from the moment it was conceived. Hopkins, now the Booth’s executive director, also headed up the team that developed the Tellus Science Museum and re-envisioned the Bartow History Museum.

Originally from Maine, Hopkins earned a journalism degree from Syracuse University and embarked on a career in radio and TV news. He worked in several Georgia markets, including Columbus and, finally, Cartersville, where he worked for a family that collected Western art and had enjoyed a good deal of business success.

Then, at the end of 1999, Hopkins said he had his “Y2K moment” when his boss announced that he was starting an art museum in Cartersville, and told Hopkins, “You’ll run it.”

Hopkins says he responded: “I don’t know anything about art, and I’m not sure I can even spell museum.”

But, at age 32, he took the challenge and ran with it. Since it took more nearly three years to build the Booth Museum, Hopkins spent that time researching what it takes to assemble a collection, create exhibitions, and generally run a museum. He also traveled through the American West to acquaint himself with its culture, history, and art. That was a real highlight, he said, asking “How many people get to visit Yosemite National Park for their job?”

Hopkins also hit the books and took courses in museum studies, Western history, and art history at five universities before settling on Oklahoma University. There he earned his master’s degree, and his thesis on the Western art of Andy Warhol became a national traveling exhibition in 2019. “I am very proud,” he said. “Despite some COVID setbacks, the exhibition, called “Warhol and the West,” visited four major venues and the companion book received several awards.”

The Booth now is the largest museum of its kind in the Southeast. It has received a range of awards through the years, including Best Art Museum by USAToday Readers’ Choice 10Best awards program in 2020, 2021 and 2022.

The nonprofit that runs Booth Museum, Georgia Museums, Inc., (GMI) recently added Savoy Automobile Museum to its collection. Hopkins stepped down as Executive Director of GMI to focus on the Booth, where his crash course in museums began. “I was already stretched thin among the three museums, and with a fourth on the horizon, I knew it was important to have a new leader for GMI,” he said. “Then I could turn my full attention back to the Booth.”