FORT MORGAN — — The West Gallery at Fort Morgan Museum is open to the public again, with many new, special things to see.

The exhibits in the gallery are the culmination of many years of planning and hard work by museum staff, the Fort Morgan Heritage Foundation and contractor Traub Design Associates.

Exhibits Redesign Project Manager/Museum Educator Andrew Dunehoo said it feels “wonderful” to have years’ worth of work coming together with today’s West Gallery reopening.

If You Go What: Fort Morgan Museum’s newly reopened West Gallery When: Monday: 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Tuesday to Thursday: 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., Friday to Saturday: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Where: 414 Main St., Fort Morgan, CO 80701 Info: 970-542-4000 or cityoffortmorgan.com

But this is only the first phase of construction and renovation; the East Gallery soon will close to undergo a similar transformation.

It has been a busy couple of weeks for museum staff members, who needed to put the finishing touches on the gallery, as well as some big changes once Don and Nick got to Fort Morgan in the middle of last week, bringing still more graphics and design pieces.

“You’re starting to see a lot of finished things,” Nick Traub said Wednesday. “The cases are getting tidied up, and we have to make sure we have the electrical right. Now it’s the real detailed, object-oriented stuff.”

The details were what caught the eye of Fort Morgan Heritage Foundation President during a quick walk-through on Thursday.

“It’s coming along,” he said. “The little detail things are starting to show up, and they’re really adding a lot.”

Ostwald said he thought the museum staff and the Traubs were “doing a good job.”

“They know what they’re doing,” he said. “They’ve had it all planned out, what goes in every case.”

Heritage Foundation Board member Deb Gachne said she was excited about the reopening of the West Gallery.

“There’s an end in sight,” she said, of the long-running project.

Fellow board member Sara Canfield called the new exhibits “impressive.”

At first, Museum Curator Nikkie Cooper was a bit overcome by how things were turning out, only able to cry out, “Whoo-hoo!”

After collecting her thoughts a bit, she expounded a bit: “I think ‘whoo-hoo’ sums up a lot of it. We’ve researched, written, pulled objects, and it’s just really happening.”

Cooper said that one of the most important things for people to know about the new exhibits is that the community collaborated on it. That included people donating an item for an exhibit, donating time to help with the project or donating money to fund it.

“The community is very supportive,” Cooper said.

Dunehoo said the reopening of the West Gallery should making people “all the more excited for what’s going to be” coming in the East Gallery.

“It’s a new palate of possibilities,” he said.

Dunehoo said he was especially excited for the children’s track of lower-down cases with artifacts for children to see at their level.

“As an educator, what I love to see is those pieces that make it memorable,” he said. “Those visits with grandpa, that’s what they’ll remember. That’s what made me a life-long museum supporter. And as a parent, I’m excited about that.”

The Traubs will be back in Fort Morgan in mid-November to start their work on the East Gallery, and museum staff will start working on clearing it out even sooner, according to Dunehoo.

Contact Times Staff Writer Jenni Grubbs at jgrubbs@fmtimes.com twitter.com/JenniGrubbs