The Elizabeth and Bolling Haxall Building serves as the Museum’s main building housing exhibit space, the Museum Store, Admissions, Robert O. Cox Theatre, Homer Dodge Education Center, Lou Smith Library and Marion Clayton Link Archives, Tony & Jim Lewis Boardroom, and the administrative offices.
The Haxall Building features four exhibits: The Lure of the Thousand Islands in the David L. Coffin Jr. Gallery, Chrysler Marine Concept Artwork of Bob Adair in the concourse gallery, A Student Point of View: Artwork of the 1000 Islands from the TICSD Community Connections Program in the Homer L. Dodge Gallery, and our lobby boat(s) and introductory exhibit to the Museum and the 1000 Islands in the Virginia & Fred Gordon Gallery. The lobby boat(s) changes every season.
The Lure of the Thousand Islands
What do you think of when you hear the word recreation? Maybe some sort of outdoor activity or sport? The origins of the word show that it also once meant to recover from illness, through rest, activity, or even by eating. It was for these reasons people, beginning in the late 1800s boarded trains in polluted, overcrowded, and dirty cities of the North Eastern United States to awake the next morning to the fresh crisp air, blue skies, and cool clean waters of the St. Lawrence River and the famed Thousand Islands.
Beginning in early May the grand hotels and cottages of the Thousand Islands and River towns began to fill with summer residents and vacationers. But people did not come to just relax idle, they came to get out on the water in boats to fish, race, swim, and socialize with others. The Lure of the Thousand Islands offers visitors a glimpse into what summer social life was like on the St. Lawrence River by exploring various recreational activities. These range from well-known pastimes such as guide fishing- to the unexpected, such as the wash tub races at Thousand Islands Park, shown above.
Chrysler Marine Concept Artwork of Bob Adair
Chrysler Marine Concept Artwork of Bob Adair explores the development of a boat from early concepts to cruising the water through the lens of Bob Adair’s artwork. Bob Adair was one of the designers for Chrysler’s boat manufacturing division in the 1970s. He and other designers created renderings and concepts to show Chrysler’s executives a detailed vision of the interior and exterior designs prior to production decisions. The sixteen renderings comprising the Chrysler Marine Artwork Collection are shown alongside images and advertising material of the production models.
This exhibition is made possible by the recent donation of the Chrysler Marine Artwork Collection by the Wooden Boat Association of North Texas.
A Student Point of View: Artwork of the 1000 Islands from the TICSD Community Connections Program
The overall goal of the Community Connections program is to provide place-based hands-on educational opportunities for the students in Thousand Island Central School District. As the title of the program suggests another major component of Community Connections is to use the projects as a way to connect students with subject matter experts from a number of local organizations, museums, and universities.
Students enjoy grade-specific projects that relate directly to the history and ecology of the St. Lawrence River. The artwork on display in this gallery is the culmination of the 2024 Community Connections program.
