By John Huxman
Freelance reporter
Special to the Tribune
The Heart of America Science Resource Center will be hosting “The Great Ice Age Summit,” this spring, April 25-27 in Haviland. This summit will feature several guest speakers and presenters including Michael and Beverly Oard, Brian Young, Stan Lutz, and Raven Brown as well as the museum curator himself, Jerry Simmons.
The Oards authored a creation science book entitled “Life in the Great Ice Age,” which was published in 1993. They will be doing several of the group presentations. Brian Young, who has been at the museum in the past with his “Semi-saurus” display (a dinosaur statue on a semi-truck trailer) will be doing a presentation as well as bringing the chapel message on Sunday. Stan Lutz and Raven Brown will each host workshops. One of the central features of the summit will be an Expo showcasing a ten or more creation museums from the area. This is the second such summit that Heart of America has hosted. Jerry Simmons said that the first summit drew around 600 visitors. That was three years ago. Simmons is hopeful that this time around there may be as many as a thousand visitors.
The main focus of the upcoming summit will be the Ice Age. This is the special focus of the Heart of America Science Resource Center. The center prominently features a mammoth shaped sign on 54 highway and its star display inside is a full-scale, mounted, cast reproduction of the Burning Tree Mastodon skeleton. Simmons and his wife Linda started Heart of America, originally as the final project for her business degree. Originally they had purchased the structure, an old machine shop, with the intention of reworking it into a storage facility, but as they worked on the building they felt that the Lord was leading them to turn it into a museum. Jerry, who has particular skill, training, and interest in geology, has amassed the museum’s collection. Right now, the building is still a work in progress. For that reason, the presentations and the Expo in April will be hosted at the Ross-Ellis Center at Barclay College. The museum will be used for the workshops and as the launching point for a field trip, since it has the facilities for those. There will also be a ceremony dedicating the museum’s Ice Age Room to Joe Taylor, the man who originally created the mural and cast the mastodon skeleton in that room.
The proposed schedule for the event is:
Friday, April 25:
1 p.m. Ice Age Facts with the Oards
2 p.m. Educational Activities & Demonstrations for Kids
3 p.m. Arrival-table/Booth setup for Creation Ministries Fellowship
6: p.m. Creation Ministry Displays Open to the Public
7 p.m. Ice Age Presentation for all ages by Michael Oard.
Saturday, April 26:
9 a.m. Creation Ministries Networking Meeting
11 a.m. Ice Age Room Dedication to Joe Taylor
12:30 p.m. Ice Age Presentation for all ages by Brian Young
2 p.m. Field Trip to Kiowa County Quarry with Jerry Simmons and Michael Oard, Fossil Casting Workshop with Stan Lutz
6 p.m. Creation Ministry Displays Open to the Public
7 p.m. Ice Age Presentation for all ages by Michael Oard.
Sunday 10:30 a.m. Chapel Service with Brian Young.
Simmons said that the museum’s website, hoasrc.com, should soon be updated to include information about the coming summit. People are encouraged to sign up in advance, especially for the workshops as the organizers need two weeks forewarning to be able to have all of the necessary materials on hand. For more information and registration instructions email linda@hoasrc.com or call 620-862-5654 or 620-518-3167. The Heart of America Science Resource Center website is Heart of America Science Resource Center – Honoring the Lord in Science.
