The Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation recently donated $5,000 to the Delaware Agricultural Museum in support of the redesign and expansion of the museum’s poultry exhibit, a project that was launched earlier this year.
Covering an area of approximately 2,400 cubic feet, poultry is the largest of the Ag Museum’s permanent exhibits to include “The Birth of the Broiler Industry” Cecile Steele’s chicken house (circa 1923); the structure is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Steele is credited with launching the broiler industry which, 96 years later, remains Delaware’s most valuable agricultural product. Ag Museum Director Carolyn Claypoole is planning to make poultry the “highlight” of the Delaware Agricultural Museum exhibits, providing visitors of all ages with an educational experience focused on the industry, past, present and future.
The poultry exhibit is also the museum’s first interactive learning center for elementary school-age children with a science, technology, engineering and mathematics-based curriculum. The Perdue gift is key to this program and the funds will be used to develop the poultry industry “Vertical Integration” display with associated educational activities.
For more information, visit http://agriculturalmuseum.org.
