(Radio Iowa) – An exhibit now running at the History Center in Cedar Rapids tells the story of a local communications company that reached around the world and into space. Center curator Tara Templeman says they got a chance to tell the story of the Collins Radio Company as part of their STEM education efforts. “They designed some virtual reality training on their products that pilots can use to help them navigate in low visibility. And so we were able to bring that headset into a display to show people how Collins got from Art Collins being a kid playing with ham radios in his parents’ attic to what Collins is today,” she says.

Collins created the company in 1931 and provided radio equipment for some historic efforts in American history. “Arctic expeditions and sending people into space when you wanted to make sure that people would be heard and that contact would be continuous, you went with Collins,” Templeman says.

The work on the arctic expedition led to interest from the military and more work during World War Two. Collins later focused on aviation and then the company helped with the effort to land on the moon. The company merged with Rockwell International in 1971 to form Rockwell Collins and then Rockwell Collins merged with United Technologies Corporation to form Collins Aerospace in 2018. Templeman says the exhibit chronicles that history with a touch of the most modern technology

“There is the virtual reality headset that people can try on and go through a simulation of landing a plane in Alaska, and then we do have video footage that is playing that is very similar to what the person wearing the headset is seeing,” she says. The exhibit opened this month and is expected to run for three months. “The first floor of the museum is free to view, so there’s no cost to see the Collins exhibit specifically, and there’s a handful of artifacts that are on display that tell the history of some of the early Collins employees and innovations a little bit on how art Collins got Collins started in the first place,” she says.

The History Center is open noon to four p-m on Tuesdays and Fridays, 4 to 8 p-m on Thursdays, and 10 to 4 p-m on Saturday. She says they can make arrangement for special visits with groups.