CHANUTE — In Africa, interpretive dance is an education.
Natives dressed up in antelope costumes for elaborate dance ceremonies to connect with spirits they believed were linked to a benevolent god. They believed a god that was part-human, part-antelope taught their ancestors how to farm.
Dance teaches not just physical movement but also history and the ancient skills needed to survive in society, Conrad Froehlich, director of the Martin and Osa Johnson Safari Museum, told a group of fourth-graders visiting from Iola’s SAFE BASE summer school program.
SAFE BASE students visited the safari museum in small groups this week.
This was the first week of the summer program. Each week features educational activities from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Monday through Wednesday with a field trip on Thursdays. Students can still sign up, and attendance can be limited to one week at a time or the entire program.
This past week, students learned about animals and more. In addition to the trips to the safari museum, they attended cooking classes and worked in the garden, or took part in various other activities. Friday they visited the Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita.
Next week, they’ll go to the Woolaroc Museum and Wildlife Preserve near Bartlesville, Okla.
An interesting note about the trip to Woolaroc: Safari museum director Froehlich showed students a table made from an elephant’s leg, which was the only elephant killed by the Johnsons. The head of that same elephant is on display at the Woolaroc museum.
The week of June 14, is about aviation. They’ll hear from an impersonator, Bill Nicks, who will portray famous aviator Wilbur Wright. Younger students will take a field trip to Exploration Place in Wichita. Older students will visit Amelia Earhart museums in Atchison, and will go ziplining.
The final week, starting June 21, they’ll cool off at the Rock River Rapids, an aquatic park at Derby.
THE TRIP to Chanute was important not only to teach students about African culture, but also to show them “the amazing things we have right in our own backyard,” SAFE BASE director Angela Henry said.
“I’m really happy how impressed the kids have been by the museum,” Henry said.
Martin and Osa Johnson were explorers, photographers, filmmakers and authors from Kansas who studied the people and wildlife of East and Central Africa, the South Pacific Islands and British North Borneo.
The museum opened in 1961 and relocated into the renovated Santa Fe Depot in 1993.