By CRISTINA JANNEY, Hays Post
Confetti flew and staff cheered as the Sternberg Museum of Natural History celebrated its 1 millionth visitor Friday.
The unsuspecting visitor Ashley Cooper and her five children — Aiden, Adam, Arron, Alexander and Adalyn, who are from near Lincoln, Kan. — received a lifetime membership to the museum and a basket of gifts from the museum gift shop. The children range in ages from 11 to 1.
Video courtesy of the Sternberg Museum and the Hays CVB.
Cooper and her children traveled to Hays to participate in the museum's home-school program.
Cooper said she was excited about the lifetime membership and said the family will use it in the future.
"We definitely like to go see the dinosaurs and the dig. The kids really like that," she said.
The family tries to make it the museum at least a couple of times per year as part of the family's home-school science curriculum.
"When they are studying certain things and they have things here that are pertinent, we definitely come. It hands-on and I love to bring that to life," Cooper said. "It makes it a lot more interesting."
Cooper said the family was especially excited to see a new shark find that was discovered near Tipton, close to where the family lives.
Not long after the establishment of the Kansas State Normal College in 1902, some private collections of these early settlers were given to the young institution that would later be known as Fort Hays State University, according to the Sternberg website. This collection was the forebear of what eventually become the Sternberg.
The Sternberg opened at its current location at 3000 Sternberg Drive on March 13, 1999. The museum did not start counting its visitors until that date.
"It means there are a lot of people coming to Hays," said Reese Barrick, museum director, of Friday's celebration. "There is a lot of support from Hays. There are a lot of people who drop in from all over the state who come here.
"It is just kind of exciting that we have had 1 million people here and we are still going strong."
Barrick added, "I think we are looking forward to our next millionth. We hope that we can maybe get it in a shorter time than 20 years."