Science Educator, Bubble Showman!
FUN BUBBLES GIVE HIM A CHARGE, TOO
Wichita Eagle, The (KS)
January 9, 1992
If ever there was a person who was right for the job, it's Ron Tibbetts as science educator at the Wichita Omnisphere & Science Center.
He is part scientist, part comedian. At times he takes on the look of a mad scientist with his brown eyes framed by shoulder-length gray hair, mustache and long beard. Most often, though, he is a happy-go-lucky man who wants youngsters to develop a love for science.
Tibbetts, 42, is as comfortable with 15,000 volts of electricity climbing a Jacob's ladder as he is standing inside a giant soap bubble. He and part- time helper Scott Fielding show the wonders of liquid oxygen, bubbles, stars and planets, or electricity in programs every day except Monday.
A native Kansan, he grew up in Germany and Louisiana as his father served in the Air Force. After attending three high schools, Tibbetts graduated from Derby in 1965. He served four years in the Air Force, then graduated in 1981 from Radford University in Virginia with a general science degree.
Tibbetts has worked on projects with NASA, including Viking and Mariner. He created other design and engineering proposals in Houston but returned to Kansas when the job market in Texas tightened.
''We couldn't find anybody for the job, then Ron walked in," said Jose Olivarez, Omnisphere director. "He was perfect for the job."
On occasion, Tibbetts has been shocked or had his beard burn. But the work is relatively safe. He is even comfortable talking in front of the Omnisphere crowds that number from 50 to 100 per program.
His goal is simple: "I want to somehow provide kids with a sense that science is fun. Science is underfunded in the schools. Kids need a hands-on experience to give them a start, an idea. We provide that."
Tibbetts enjoys showing off with electricity and liquid oxygen, but he wanted to create a program that kids could do at home. Thus, he developed the bubble show. He built a giant bubble machine out of plastic rain gutters. It can yield a 10-foot-high bubble.
''Kids love bubbles anyway. To be put inside one, that's the ultimate," he said.
When not working at the Omnisphere, Tibbetts is at home, a few blocks away on Lewis Street, conjuring up science projects and ideas. "I never really get away from it," he said.
Wichita Eagle, The (KS)
December 27, 2000
Like the glistening spheres that float out of Ron Tibbetts' bubble wand, the Wichita Omnisphere and Science Center is living out a precarious existenc e.
One day soon, it will close for good.
Everyone - staff members, visitors, even Tibbetts, the science educator best known as "The Bubble Man" - knows it will happen. They've been preparing for months. The closing, now slated for Jan. 31, has been part of the city's plan for a decade.
And then it pops. And it's over.
"We love this place," said Martha Lawter, a teacher at Wichita's Jefferson Elementary School who visited the Omnisphere recently with her kindergartners. "I'll be very sad to see it go."
The fact is, the Omnisphere is closing because Exploration Place, the city's new children's museum and science center, has opened.
"It was always intended from the beginning, when the Exploration Place concept was developed, that Exploration Place would replace the Omnisphere facility as well as the old Children's Museum," said Wichita City Manager Chris Cherches.
Because plans to move parts of the Kansas Aviation Museum into the Omnisphere building were delayed, city leaders decided to keep the Omnisphere open a little longer. And in September, when schools began booking field trips to the Omnisphere, leaders postponed the closing again.
But now, Cherches said, contractors are lined up to make about $200,000 worth of structural renovations to the building. Work is set to begin in February.
"They sure seem serious about it this time," said Janice McKinney, acting director of the Omnisphere. She has been "acting director" for five years, another sign of the Omnisphere's questionable fate.
The Omnisphere opened in August 1976 at its current location at 220 S. Main St. The gray stone building first housed a city library, then the Municipal Court. But a $320,000 renovation, which included ripping out book stacks and installing a 30-foot planetarium dome, turned it into the only science center in the area.
During its first few years, nearly all the shows sold out. Fifty-eight people at a time filed into the planetarium, settled into the red reclining seats and watched the heavens - black holes, constellations, planets spinning through space.
But after the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center opened in Hutchinson in 1980, and the Lake Afton Public Observatory a year later, keeping the small museum running became more of a challenge.
"We're a fairly little place, and we're kind of low-tech," McKinney said.
But this year, as in years past, about 40,000 people visited the Omnisphere, despite the much larger, newer Exploration Place building less than a mile away, with its modern architecture and sleek exhibits. Since it opened April 1, Exploration Place has drawn nearly 300,000 visitors.
"I think we still have some advantages," McKinney said of the Omnisphere. "It's easy for teachers to bring kids here, because they can't get lost. And there are still things we have that no one else does."
During one recent "Bubble Circus" show, kindergartners from Jefferson Elementary shrieked and giggled as Tibbetts filled the air with soapy spheres - bubbles blown from string and straws, from wire clothes hangers and plastic produce baskets.
Five-year-old Ladeisha Brown stood up straight and smiled as Tibbetts enveloped her with a huge shiny bubble. Then all the kids, teachers and chaperones got to come onstage to do the same.
Meg Thimmesch, a fifth-grade teacher at Maize East Elementary School, appreciates the Omnisphere's shows, which are customized to teachers' lesson plans, and also its affordability.
"You can see all the displays and two shows for $2.50," Thimmesch said. "It's definitely smaller (than Exploration Place), but that's what I like about it."
Al DeSena, president of Exploration Place, understands why Wichitans would miss the Omnisphere: "It's like an old friend."
"The Omnisphere has served this community very well for 25 years now," DeSena said. "But we believe now it's time for both the Children's Museum and the Omnisphere to be part of the legacy and for us to pick it up and take it from here."
Although several of the old Children's Museum exhibits and concepts became part of Exploration Place, so far there are no plans to move any Omnisphere displays to the new museum.
Cherches said the city plans to donate the exhibits to area schools. "They definitely won't be trashed," he said. The planetarium is likely to remain a part of the aviation museum in some form, he said.
As for the three-person Omnisphere staff, all are looking for jobs elsewhere. Tibbetts has applied for work in Colorado, but he doubts he'll find anything quite as special as his current gig.
