One wacky museum

Odd, quirky, funky, kitsch. You may never look at the stuff in your attic the same way again.

I know I've walked into something. I'm just not sure what. "Yankee Doodle Dandy" is crackling over the P.A. system. A sign proclaims "No obscure talking," and another reads "On this site in 1987 nothing happened." There's a 22-foot-long Bassigator (a fish-like body with an alligator's head) and a sixties vintage Airstream trailer with a U.F.O.-looking thing crashed (okay, welded) into it.

Recovering from my initial shock at all the, er, stuff, I start giggling. On closer inspection, this stuff is funny-awfully funny-and can only be the work of someone with a screw loose or who simply doesn't take himself seriously.

That would be John Preble, self-styled curator of the U.C.M. (pronounced You-See-Um) Museum, housed in what was once a gas station one block east of the only traffic light in Abita Springs, Louisiana. The museum has an offbeat treasure trove of found, salvaged, and donated objects.

"I've always lived like this," says the artist-inventor, formerly a real estate developer, beekeeper, and PTA president, among other avocations. "Friends from LSU say, 'This is just like your dorm room.'" "So you've always been weird?" I ask. "Yes, thank you," John responds.

The collecting habit he says got out of hand is crammed into a series of buildings, including the House of Shards, an old barn covered with some 15,000 tile and pottery fragments. There's also the Bait Shack, where for 25 cents you can have your fortune told by a coin-operated voodoo priestess mannequin named Sister Claire Veaux. (Her excellent advice to me included never to get in a traffic jam with a boring person.)

Whirligigs John created from bicycle wheels twirl overhead. An Elvis shrine propped on an old Coca-Cola cooler bids you "Willkommen" to the main exhibit hall, where there is a button-operated, animated diorama of martians at a New Orleans Mardi Gras parade; an "insult yourself" device; exaggeration postcards; and a myriad of other curiosities.

Teenagers love this place, but the U.C.M. Museum is not where you want to bring your kids to encourage them to clean up their rooms. It is, however, the kind of interactive environment that may inspire them to think about what makes art. It also may make you nervous. What if they never grow up, like John?

After her visit, one little girl announced, "Mom, I'm not throwing away my rock collection." John says it's these moments he appreciates.

On your way out, don't forget to wake up the red bean-eating turtle on the bottom of the fish pond by yelling, "Wake up, you bum!" No way am I going to blow the secret of how this works. Have fun!

Copyright Southern Progress Corporation Aug 2003
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