The floor-to-ceiling photo shows Weibrecht, a former Olympic Alpine skiier, competing in an Alpine super combined race in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. The features of his face are fixed in a look of determination and grit as he sails downhill. Weibrecht said he was “blown away” and surprised to see the photo at the museum. He had no idea it would be on display.

“It’s quite an honor,” he said.

The newly-renovated and modernized Olympic museum, located in the Olympic Center, is filled with exhibits that tell stories with artifacts. People can go for a bobsled run, soar from the ski jumps and relive the 1980 Miracle on Ice at the museum, which officially reopened in Lake Placid on Thursday. Uniforms from the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, torches from winter Olympics near and far, and hundreds of pins from Olympics past and contemporary speak of the styles, sports cultures and social themes of their time.

But for the museum’s designers and the many community members attending the museum’s opening on Wednesday, the stories didn’t start and end with the artifacts — the exhibits came to life as more than 100 people, including former Olympians, relived their own memories of Lake Placid’s sports history.

State officials cut a ribbon with ice hockey skates on Wednesday, marking the reopening of the Lake Placid Olympic Museum in the Olympic Center. Pictured from left are ORDA President and CEO Mike Pratt, Deputy Director of State Operations Todd Westhuis, Lake Placid Olympic Museum board Chair John Becker and ORDA Board of Directors Chair Joe Martens. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

Asked what he was thinking during the competition in Vancouver, when the photo on display was taken, Weibrecht said he was probably just trying to get down the hill — combined races like that one weren’t the easiest for him.

“Anytime I was skiing slalom, I was just trying to make it down,” he said.

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The Olympic story

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The redesigned and modernized Lake Placid Olympic Museum features interactive exhibits, including a bobsled run simulation. Pictured from the right, Anna Pavone and Corrine Shambo sway from left to right in a stationary bobsled while they watch a virtual bobsled run at the museum’s reopening celebration on Wednesday. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

Weibrecht’s determined expression in the photo is why Ted Johnson, the president of Hadley Exhibits — the Buffalo-based company that designed the new museum — fought for the photo’s placement at the end of the museum’s hallway. The exhibit designers decided that, per Johnson’s recommendation, Weibrecht’s photo best told the Olympic story.

“This was the story of why people want to become an Olympian,” Fotini Galanes, the creative director at Hadley Exhibits, said of the photo. “That drive, that passion. And that was our main focus.”

The Lake Placid Olympic Museum first opened in the Olympic Center just after the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, according to Collections Manager Julia Herman.

She said the museum joined the Olympic Museums Network as its 32nd member just over a year ago — it’s one of three Olympic museums in the U.S. to earn the distinction.

The museum’s renovation was three years in the making. Once Hadley Exhibits planned and designed the museum’s layout, museum staff — spearheaded by museum Director Alison Haas and Herman — worked for countless hours to assemble the artifacts in their rightful places. Herman said the Lake Placid Olympic Museum has the second-largest collection of winter Olympic artifacts in the world.

This display features artifacts from the historic “Miracle on Ice” game during the 1980 Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

“Every last detail is thought of” in the museum’s redesign, Galanes said, because there are “so many stories to tell.” The museum started with an empty room and a one-page concept outline and grew to an interactive museum experience that Galanes said reaches beyond the exhibits and displays that now fill its rooms.

She said a person who restored an Olympic medal for the museum refused to accept payment from Hadley Exhibits — he knew the medal would be displayed in a museum, and his three daughters are Olympic hopefuls.

“The reach is far,” Galanes said of the museum.

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The pin

Olympic rings from the 1980 Games, restored and pulled out of storage, are seen here hung at the Olympic Center. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

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Marketa Zayonc wandered through the museum’s exhibits on Wednesday with her son, Maxim. For Marketa, the exhibits reflected her own past — she and her husband are former Olympic lugers, and her husband competed in the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid. Maxim got to find his father’s name on a placard in one of the exhibits.

Originally from the Czech Republic, Marketa competed in luge for her home country during the 2002 and 2006 Winter Olympics. She said being an Olympian was an “awesome journey” that eventually brought her to Lake Placid and its “beautiful (bobsled) track” at Mt. Van Hoevenberg. She said Lake Placid is rich with Olympic tradition, and now, she wants to pass that tradition on to her son.

He’s tried sliding a little bit, but he’s only 10 years old right now.

As Marketa and Maxim browsed through a collection of Olympic pins at the museum on Wednesday, she spotted the pin from the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah.

“I was there!” she said to Maxim. “That’s our pin!”

Marketa said that seeing the pin made her feel proud to be a part of the Olympic culture. She said she still has her Salt Lake City pin, and she told Maxim on Wednesday that she wanted to pass it on to him.

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The rings

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A hidden piece of Lake Placid’s Olympic history was also unveiled with the museum on Wednesday — the original 1980 Olympic rings, which ORDA Communications Director Darcy Norfolk said have been in storage for years. They were mounted on the side of the Olympic Center building and lit for the first time that night.

Norfolk said Olympic Center staff recently brought the rings out of storage, dusted them off and, with some help from village employees, installed LED lighting to backlight the rings with the classic Olympic colors. After a series of speeches on Wednesday about the museum from state officials and museum board members and staff, the crowd of community members and officials gathered outside to watch the ceremonial lighting of the rings. Everyone erupted in applause as the rings were illuminated in blue, yellow, black, green and red.

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The investment

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ORDA Board of Directors Chair Joe Martens recognized the state’s increasing investments in ORDA’s capital budget over the last five years as crucial to the museum upgrades — the state has invested $550 million in ORDA’s venues through its capital budget over the last six years, according to Todd Westhuis, deputy director of state operations for Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office.

“I’m tempted to say that this is another Lake Placid miracle,” Martens said of the museum opening, referencing the gold medal earned by the U.S. mens hockey team during the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid. “But it’s not a miracle — it took vision, determination, financial support, teamwork and a lot more.”

The state invested a total of $105 million in the Olympic Center upgrades, according to a Wednesday news release from Hochul’s office. Norfolk said on Thursday that $1.4 million of that funding went to upgrading the museum.

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The people

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ORDA President and CEO Mike Pratt said on Wednesday that he was proud of the museum opening because he sees it as an accomplishment for everyone in the Lake Placid community. He reminisced about his years working in the Olympic Center’s ice rinks — spotlighting figure skating competitions and driving the Zamoboni on the ice crew during the 1980 Winter Olympics. He said his takeaway from those memories is that the people behind the sports are what made the Olympic Center’s history — and Lake Placid’s sports culture — special.

“What really makes this place special is all the people,” Pratt said. “We’ve got tremendous natural resources, but it’s the people that make it special.”

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Visit

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The Lake Placid Olympic Museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $15 for adults; $12 for military members, youth ages 7 through 19, and students with a student ID; $10 for groups of 20 or more people; and free for kids 6 and under. More information about the Olympic museum is available online at lakeplacidolympicmuseum.org.