Hoyt Sherman Place has come to a crossroads in its 128-year history in Des Moines. It is With recently refurbished art galleries to complement the $5.5 million restoration of its 1,250-seat theater, the mansion stands ready to reclaim its place as one of the city’s premier cultural attractions, but it will do so under new leadership.

“The future now is getting somebody in here who can now make this place come alive,” said Leisha Barcus, the executive director for the Hoyt Sherman Foundation. “I feel that my job was to get it to where it is now, and now there’s something to work with. Now, let’s get someone in here with the skills to program it and maximize its use so that it can continue to go up and up.”

Barcus, who is working with a search committee now to find her replacement, was hired by the foundation in 2001. She wrote a successful Vision Iowa grant for $700,000 and developed and implemented a capital campaign to raise support for the theater’s restoration, which was carried out between June and December of 2003. The galleries received their face lift this past summer when the Des Moines Symphony Alliance Designer ShowHouse Tour presented an opportunity for collaboration.

“Redoing the galleries this past year as part of the Symphony ShowHouse Alliance was really great for us, because now we have both sides of the house matching,” Barcus said. “I’m just as proud of these galleries as I am the other side. We are unique because we are not just a stand-alone theater, and there are tremendous opportunities for programming that includes the whole space.”

The galleries were built in 1907 as the first public art gallery in the city when the Des Moines Women’s Club took control of the property a few years after the death of business and civic leader Hoyt Sherman. The Women’s Club, which built the theater in 1923, maintained the property until the early 1990s, when a foundation was formed to take over ownership and operations of the property.

By 2001, both the theater and the galleries were in dire need of “freshening up” when Barcus joined the effort. Her background had been in economic development in Iowa, and she felt strongly that Hoyt Sherman Place “was the perfect example of downtown revitalization” and a place “crying out to be redone.”

Many people in the community adopted the vision of returning the Hoyt Sherman Place Theater to its grandeur. In 2001, there were only 100 donors listed with the foundation. Now, there are more than 800, Barcus said.

Sam O’Brien, the president of the foundation’s board of directors, calls the progress made over the past few years “the rebirth of the theater and the galleries.” For this reason, the Des Moines Business Record selected Hoyt Sherman Place as the Comeback of the Year Award for 2004.

“Hoyt Sherman is poised to become a key component to the expanding cultural scene in Des Moines,” O’Brien said. “I think Hoyt Sherman is benefiting from the excitement in the downtown area and hopefully adding some of its own energy to the growth of downtown and its cultural scene.”

Kerty Nilsson Levy, the president of the Downtown Community Alliance, agreed that downtown Des Moines is benefiting from Hoyt Sherman Place drawing a variety of people downtown with its “diverse programming schedule,” ranging from musicians to political commentators to women’s interest lectures.

O’Brien and fellow board member Tom Sullivan, credit Barcus with guiding Hoyt Sherman Place through a period of “significant organizational change and growth.”

“Her work with the patrons, the Des Moines Women’s Club, the volunteers and staff have helped us become the organization that we are today,” O’Brien said.

Barcus said the next executive director will need to have energy and passion for the job, but also some industry knowledge that she could not provide.

“The board took a chance on me, because I did not have the background in running a performing arts venue or running a not-for-profit organization,” Barcus said. “I came in with a lot of energy and tried to get people excited both internally and externally about what an important jewel it is for the city. Now, it’s a different job than when I was hired, and I feel that it needs a different skill set from someone whose career has culminated in running a performing arts venue.”

The Hoyt Sherman Foundation hopes to build on the momentum of what it has accomplished to make continued improvements. Exterior work on the mansion will now begin, thanks to a new grant. A 1926 Barton theater organ is being restored to be ready for use at the theater later this year. In the near future, a deeper stage and expanded dressing rooms and restrooms will also be needed. Each of these enhancements will hopefully make the property “a place that Des Moines cannot live without,” Barcus said.

“When you feel like you can’t live without something, you want to take really good care of it, and I hope that’s what Greater Des Moines will do,” she said. “There’s no place like this in all of our Greater Des Moines community. Another community may decide to build a performing arts venue, but you can’t duplicate the feeling of an event in the Hoyt Sherman Theater. Amelia Earhart has stood on that stage, along with Helen Keller. These are beautiful memories. The grandeur and beauty just envelops you when you come here. You kind of forget about the outside world.”