Kids expand creativity at Busytown

Friday, Oct. 13, 2000 | 9:57 a.m.

What: Busytown exhibit

Where: Lied Discovery Museum, 833 Las Vegas Blvd. N.

When: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, through Jan. 7.

Cost: $5; $4 for children ages 2-17.

Information: Call 382-3445.

With lips tightly pursed, 6-year-old Shannah Grape summoned forces from the back of her throat to emulate the sound of a fast engine as she sat in the stationary Pickle Car parked outside a mock grocery store.

With little hesitation as she rose from the one-seat prop, Shannah darted across the room to check the status of an ongoing plumbing project. She then joined a team of six at the factory who were raising foam objects via a pulley onto a second-story deck.

On this particular Sunday, Busytown was bustling. The interactive children's exhibit based on the books by Richard Scarry is on display at the Lied Discovery museum through Jan. 7.

With a shipyard, a factory, grocery store, construction site and air-operated power plant, children have an opportunity to be scientists, consumers, builders and equipment operators while celebrating the breezy world Scarry created nearly 40 years ago.

Geared toward children ages 2-10, the science- and math-based exhibit, created by the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, is designed to teach children about weight, size, shape, quantity and balance.

"It's kind of like you're in the books," said Elizabeth Walsh, whose three children were busy manipulating cranes and gears.

The children's author, whose books have sold more than 100 million copies worldwide, is known for exemplifying everyday life and common machines in such books such as "Busy, Busy Town," "Best Counting Book Ever" and and "Cars and Trucks and Things That Go."

Day-to-day activities orchestrated by characters such as the Lowly Worm, Hilda Hippo and Sergeant Murphy have for decades been studied by curious toddlers and beginning readers flipping through the giant pages.

Similar to "The Best Word Book Ever," first published in 1963, items throughout the exhibit are labeled on placards. To inspire language interest, the bilingual exhibit uses both English and Spanish.

To avoid gender-specific roles, a replica of Millie Mouse, wearing pink overalls, leather gloves and a wrench sticking from her front pocket, is affixed to the side of the factory.

Other familiar characters, such as Mr. Frumble, Sergeant Murphy and Bananas Gorilla, can be found on the displays.

"The whole concept is to step right into the pages of Busytown and meet some of these characters," said Lynne Downs, early childhood program director at the Lied Discovery Museum.

The construction site, complete with building blocks, supplies helmets to young builders -- a yellow construction hat for building and a red fire hat should the facade burn down.

Using a wheel-operated gantry crane at the shipyard, children can unload cargo from the ships and place it onto trains. At the nearby power plant children can explore air power by connecting hoses to amusing gadgets.

In the grocery store a toddler indiscriminately paired up an onion and nectarine, placed them on a manually operated conveyor belt and watched them spill into a cart strategically placed at the other end.

Outside the store, a balance scale explains to a little boy how a head of cauliflower easily outweighs a tomato and green apple.

"Busytown is an open-ended question and there are no wrong answers," Downs said, reiterating the exhibit's logo. "You can do anything you want."