The Challengers Museum

THE CHALLENGERS MUSEUM

The Museum is housed in a converted four-story brownstone which served as the Challengers’ original headquarters when they first moved from Portland to Seattle. It sits in the heart of downtown Seattle and is a popular destination for tourists and historians.

The interior space of the first and second floors has been completely emptied out, creating a large vaulted display space. The third floor houses special and traveling collections, and the fourth floor contains an archive of the Challengers’ adventures and administrative offices.

GROUND FLOOR

• A. Entrance: The Challengers Museum is open every day (except Christmas and Thanksgiving) from 10 A.M. to 6 P.M. Admission is Free. At night, the door is locked and secured with high-end commercial electronic security. A night watchman usually guards the place.
• B. Waxworks: When guests enter the museum, the first thing they see is an impressive tableau of wax figures representing the Challengers in battle. The waxworks are quite good and the costumes and equipment are either original items or faithful reproductions.
• C. Displays: A series of display cases devoted to friends, allies, and lesser known members of the Challengers, including Rex Radium, The Praying Mantis, Ladyhawke, and Gangbuster. Each is represented by a wax figure in costume, surrounded by news clippings, magazines, and other pertinent artifacts. One display is marked “Hall of Dishonor,” and tells the story of Lucky Devil, a former member of the Challengers who tried to betray the team from within. Her display contains newspaper stories about her arrest and subsequent escape.
• C. The Golden Goose: A mocked up fuselage and wing of a transport plane emerges from the wall and looms over the room above the C displays on the right of the map. It’s painted to look like “The Golden Goose,” the Challengers’ air transportation during their early years. A figure of Vanguard seems to be suspended below the wing, as if being held aloft on one of his force shield platforms, and a figure of Nightengale stands ready to jump out.
• D. The War Wagon: On a raised dais is a heavily armored two-and-a-half ton truck, painted red white and blue. This was the “War Wagon,” the Challengers’ personal ground transport. It’s fully restored, though the engine is disabled.
• E. Restroomsand stairs up to the second and third floors.
• F. The Tableau of Infamy: A raised dais where wax figures depicting the Sin-Dicate are arranged in threatening poses. On the wall behind them is one of the few authentic relics of this criminal enterprise, a large seven sided tabletop with an inlayed map of the world. The table bears the scars from multiple knives being stabbed into it. From left to right facing the dais, the Sin-Dicate are:
  • Doctor Dagon, Wizard of the Nth Dimension: A wiry man who wears a white and gold uniform and sports an oily goatee and mustache. He carries a ray pistol that looks large and out of date by today's technology. As the signage points out, Dagon was actually a scientist from Ohio who used high technology while calling it “magic.”
  • The Gray Ghoul, Maker of Monsters: A hunched figure of a man with gray skin and a rat-like visage. He wears tattered robes, and wicked claws gleam at his fingertips. Warped by ancient texts of alchemy, he used his forbidden knowledge to turn first himself and then others into creatures of nightmare.
  • Inferna, Queen of the Fire People: A beautiful woman, tall, with red-gold hair and a flawless bronze complexion, smiles evilly as holographic “flames” dance on her hands. The Fire People were a lost race the Challengers encountered on one of their many adventures. For unknown reasons, Inferna pursued them back to civilization and made war upon them many times.
  • Boss Sovereign, the Gorilla Mob Boss: A male Silverback gorilla, standing upright, wearing the robes of a Roman Emperor. Born a normal gorilla, he was the pet of a Mad Scientist called Professor Zero, who raised his intelligence to human levels. Eventually, Solomon (as he was called then) decided he was sovereign over his own actions, and was in fact superior to Zero, and could run Zero’s operations more effectively. He violently deposed his master. After that, Boss Sovereign ran the mobs unopposed and founded his own criminal empire known as Crimenet.
  • Widow-Maker: A man wearing a black costume with a skull mask, who carries a whip and a rapier. Widow-Maker was a savage killer from the desert southwest.
  • Gremlin: A slightly built figure wearing a half red and half black. She holds a deck of playing cards in one hand and a pistol in the other. Gremlin was the shadowy master of fortune and luck.
• G. Lab Replica: A replica of Dreamweaver's original laboratory stands within a glassed in area. While everything is a harmless reproduction, when the power is on, beakers bubble, “chemicals” emit fumes, and an authentic Jacob’s ladder throws sparks.
• H. Elevators
• I. Displays: These cases feature newspapers, magazines, medals, letters of thanks, and photographs of the Challengers with many celebrities, both super powered and not.

SECOND FLOOR

The second floor of the museum was the third floor of the original building.

• A. Stairs
• B. Elevator
• C. Special Exhibits Area: This space is used for touring shows and special collections. It also serves as a reception hall for fundraising events. At the moment, the space is devoted to a collection of posters from the Vietnam War featuring the Challengers and other superheroes.
• D. Theater: This small theater shows documentaries about the Challengers, and about supers in society.