As the largest landowner on the Kodiak Archipelago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is set to showcase 1.9 million acres of land and its inhabitants when it opens the new Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center at Center Avenue.

A ribbon cutting community opening, Nov. 17, called Crossroads of Conservation and Education, marks the long-awaited debut of the new refuge center Kodiakans have watched go up since groundbreaking in May 2006.

The refuge visitor center occupies the site of the old Donnely-Acheson building that once housed the local post office and the Kodiak Area Native Association. The building stood vacant in recent years with only part of it used at one time by a small church and other offices used it as a construction company headquarters.

Fish and Wildlife Service demolished the building to put what is now a gem downtown across from the ferry docks. The ferry dock will be located across the channel on Near Island if the Alaska Marine Highway System goes ahead with its plans.

Tina Shaw, refuge visitor center manager, said she expects to see people “from around the country and from across the globe” as not only Kodiak residents visit but also travelers that have been a mainstay in Kodiak’s vibrancy as one of Alaska’s larger towns and fishing ports.

“The center will host cruise ship passengers, ferry passengers and independent travelers,” Shaw said.

“The center is a tool to inspire interest in the refuge and recreation within. Ultimately, conservation is the result of linking the resource with the visitor,” Shaw said.

“People conserve what they know. The more we know the more we care about wildlife and the lands,” she said.

Knowing is key to the center. Shaw and planners have made the center into a place of education.

Shaw said two-thirds of the Kodiak Archipelago is wildlife refuge, and that only 10 percent of the people who live in Kodiak will actually visit the refuge that stretches from the north tip of the island to the south end.

“Much of the refuge is remote and only accessible by boat and plane,” Shaw said, emphasizing that provides more reason to make the center an education tool.

“One hundred percent of the images inside are of the Kodiak refuge,” she said.

Shaw outlined four main elements developed for visitor viewing, some hands-on, inside the building that was built at a cost of $8.3 million, all federal funds.

Architects and engineers in Anchorage and Vancouver, British Colombia, designed the new multilevel building with two stories and an observation deck that allows visitors to look out across the channel toward Near Island.

From the ground, the building is 26 feet high and 8,000 square feet surrounded by spruce, green lawn and shrubbery.

Inside, a centerpiece attraction is the skeleton of a whale restored during the Gray Whale Project by a group of Kodiak residents that spent the past several years preparing the whale and moving it into the center. The last phase of the project took place in October when the whale was moved into the center in five sections from head to tail.

The skeleton hangs from the second floor of the center in an opening where it can also be seen from the first floor.

The whale was discovered on a beach at Pasagshak almost six years ago.

“The whale is the most complete gray whale in North America,” Shaw said.

On the first floor of the center, exhibits focus on different aspects of the refuge, including a standing Kodiak brown bear.

Shaw said the exhibits have a whimsical touch, ideas brought by John Ivie, a Fish and Wildlife employee from Portland, Ore.

For example, one exhibit is the salmon system of the Karluk River. The exhibit teaches the biology of salmon, their range and spawning, but it also has a bit of interactive whimsy with interviews of the fish, each with a characteristic personality, like a chum salmon in the guise of movie director Woody Allen talking about how hard it is to be a chum, a sociable pal.

The bear exhibit, Secrets to Success, features a bear food market like a farmers market with emphasis on how hard it is to be a bear. Visitors can also listen to the heartbeat of a denning sow with her two cubs.

Another exhibit, Feathers in the Fog, is a birding showcase about the birds on Kodiak Island. Visitors can match feathers with different bird species and listen to bird sounds.

Another exhibit is a large map of Alaska showing the entire national wildlife refuge system, teaching visitors how Alaska fits into the system of public lands.

Regional director of the Fish and Wildlife Service Thomas O. Melius will give opening remarks, along with Charles Money, Alaska Geographic executive director.

Mirror writer Bryan Martin can be reached via e-mail at bmartin@kodiakdailymirror.com.