New Wonders of Wildlife aquarium and museum turns conservation knob to 11
Johnny Morris
The new Johnny Morris’ Wonders of Wildlife National Museum and Aquarium doesn’t have just one multi-story mega-tank parading exotic fish species. There are at least three  and that’s not counting the Bait Ball  a basement-to-second-floor  see-through aquatic sheath in which thousands of little herring swim around in what I can only imagine is abject terror while a handful of sharks circle them and sometimes glide through them.
And when it came time  in late September  to open this new animal destination built around Bass Pro Shops’ flagship store in southwestern Missouri  Johnny Morris didn’t just cut a ribbon and start taking tickets. The Bass Pro impresario threw a gala party and brought in fishing and hunting pals  including country music superstars  actor Kevin Costner and former Presidents Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush. The local paper the next day spoke of a “private ‘jet jam’” at the airport.
In other words  the Wonders of Wildlife aesthetic  as one employee put it  is “maximalist.” If there’s an empty space   Morris  is going to squeeze in a live snake tank  a few massive orca models suspended from the ceiling  or a taxidermied puma nestled in faux rocks on an otherwise ordinary staircase.
And if there’s a small city on the Ozarks plateau that could use a new family tourism draw  then  Morris  is going to give it one that combines aspects of New York’s American Museum of Natural History and Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium in 350 000 square feet of space  roughly two-thirds the size of the Shedd.
 Morris  visited the Shedd and AMNH frequently in  his  planning  a spokesman said  but the result is hardly your conventional aquarium. The aquarium portion of Wonders of Wildlife doesn’t limit itself  for instance  to water-dwelling live animals. Owls inhabit a barn setting  and brown bears live where the pathway  briefly  ventures out of doors. In the cave environment  that fluttering you hear isn’t only the beating of your heart; it’s the live bats flapping beside you  behind wire mesh.
“I don’t know if I’d get in a car from Chicago just to see this  but I’d sure put it on my trip ” said opening-day visitor Larry Smith  a retiree from Springfield and unabashed Johnny Morris fan.
The abundance in these halls — 1.5 miles of pathway through scores of newly made natural-history dioramas and watery habitats — won’t shock anybody who has visited Bass Pro Shops  the retail empire  Morris  built from humble beginnings selling bait in  his  dad’s Springfield liquor store.
In other words: Look at all the pretty fish  and wouldn’t it be awesome to hook one? The main point is that taxes on hunting and fishing gear and licenses have funded state and federal conservation efforts to the tune of tens of billions of dollars since 1937. You can look it up by  well  looking up at one of the aquarium’s walls  where  Morris  has the stats laid out.
It’s a worthy message to deliver  especially to folks whose most vigorous hunting trips come in the aisles at Costco. But the effect in the galleries can be disquieting.  The dioramas Morris  has commissioned are  by and large  spectacular. The backdrops are hand-painted. The animals strike vivid poses: A grizzly bear chases wolves through an Alaskan tundra scene  and a herd of caribou surges uphill out of a roiling river. Some dioramas are like windows onto a specific moment; others are  again  maximalist  as in the Africa room  where visitors walk in the middle of an enormous set stuffed and mounted with virtually every animal of that continent you can think of — Africa’s greatest hits.
But just as you are admiring the homage to the national parks in a series of dioramas showcasing marquee species from some of them  a little plaque will inform you that this particular bear standing in a stream amid salmon at Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge is  in fact  a 10-foot 6-inch brown bear taken with bow and arrow by John Paul Morris  one of  Johnny ’s sons  at Deadman Bay  Kodiak Island  Alaska  in October 2011.
Elsewhere  there’s the “longest alligator gar ever recorded ” an 8-foot 3 ¾-inch specimen taken by John Paul and  Johnny  on a Texas river in 2007. In a great hall of deer trophies — think hunting lodge gone wild — all the mounted heads act as wallpaper and have plaques describing their provenance  including one fine fellow marked with the poignant  “Illinois Road Kill  Hancock County  Ill.”
The new Johnny Morris’ Wonders of Wildlife National Museum and Aquarium doesn’t have just one multi-story mega-tank parading exotic fish species. There are at least three  and that’s not counting the Bait Ball  a basement-to-second-floor  see-through aquatic sheath in which thousands of little herring swim around in what I can only imagine is abject terror while a handful of sharks circle them and sometimes glide through them.
And when it came time  in late September  to open this new animal destination built around Bass Pro Shops’ flagship store in southwestern Missouri  [TGT] didn’t just cut a ribbon and start taking tickets. The Bass Pro impresario threw a gala party and brought in fishing and hunting pals  including country music superstars  actor Kevin Costner and former Presidents Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush. The local paper the next day spoke of a “private ‘jet jam’” at the airport.
In other words  the Wonders of Wildlife aesthetic  as one employee put it  is “maximalist.” If there’s an empty space   [TGT]is going to squeeze in a live snake tank  a few massive orca models suspended from the ceiling  or a taxidermied puma nestled in faux rocks on an otherwise ordinary staircase.
And if there’s a small city on the Ozarks plateau that could use a new family tourism draw  then  [TGT]is going to give [TGT] one that combines aspects of New York’s American Museum of Natural History and Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium in 350 000 square feet of space  roughly two-thirds the size of the Shedd.
 [TGT]visited the Shedd and AMNH frequently in  [TGT]  planning  a spokesman said  but the result is hardly your conventional aquarium. The aquarium portion of Wonders of Wildlife doesn’t limit itself  for instance  to water-dwelling live animals. Owls inhabit a barn setting  and brown bears live where the pathway  briefly  ventures out of doors. In the cave environment  that fluttering you hear isn’t only the beating of your heart; it’s the live bats flapping beside you  behind wire mesh.
“I don’t know if I’d get in a car from Chicago just to see this  but I’d sure put it on my trip ” said opening-day visitor Larry Smith  a retiree from Springfield and unabashed [TGT] fan.
The abundance in these halls — 1.5 miles of pathway through scores of newly made natural-history dioramas and watery habitats — won’t shock anybody who has visited Bass Pro Shops  the retail empire  [TGT]built from humble beginnings selling bait in  [TGT]  dad’s Springfield liquor store.
In other words: Look at all the pretty fish  and wouldn’t it be awesome to hook one? The main point is that taxes on hunting and fishing gear and licenses have funded state and federal conservation efforts to the tune of tens of billions of dollars since 1937. You can look it up by  well  looking up at one of the aquarium’s walls  where  [TGT]has the stats laid out.
It’s a worthy message to deliver  especially to folks whose most vigorous hunting trips come in the aisles at Costco. But the effect in the galleries can be disquieting.  The dioramas [TGT]has commissioned are  by and large  spectacular. The backdrops are hand-painted. The animals strike vivid poses: A grizzly bear chases wolves through an Alaskan tundra scene  and a herd of caribou surges uphill out of a roiling river. Some dioramas are like windows onto a specific moment; others are  again  maximalist  as in the Africa room  where visitors walk in the middle of an enormous set stuffed and mounted with virtually every animal of that continent you can think of — Africa’s greatest hits.
But just as you are admiring the homage to the national parks in a series of dioramas showcasing marquee species from some of them  a little plaque will inform you that this particular bear standing in a stream amid salmon at Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge is  in fact  a 10-foot 6-inch brown bear taken with bow and arrow by John Paul Morris  one of  Johnny ’s sons  at Deadman Bay  Kodiak Island  Alaska  in October 2011.
Elsewhere  there’s the “longest alligator gar ever recorded ” an 8-foot 3 ¾-inch specimen taken by John Paul and  Johnny  on a Texas river in 2007. In a great hall of deer trophies — think hunting lodge gone wild — all the mounted heads act as wallpaper and have plaques describing their provenance  including one fine fellow marked with the poignant  “Illinois Road Kill  Hancock County  Ill.”