PORTSMOUTH — It stands as a symbol of the commercial success this river town was known for. It’s the old Securities Central Bank building, with its solid granite exterior and marble columned interior, in the heart of downtown Portsmouth.

However, times change and Securities Central joined the parade of mergers that hit businesses from time to time, leaving its name to history and the structure vacant. But the later not for long.

Community activists who were wanting a greater presences of the arts in their city saw that the building could be transformed into a new definition, one that could bring more to their home.

“We didn’t have an arts center in this area,” Patricia Holbrook-Knox, of the Southern Ohio Museum Center, said. “There were those who thought it would be great to have one.”

Turning that prospect into a reality got a significant boost when the proceeds from the estate of a successful businessman in the area was left to the city and used for the creation of a museum.

That was 30 years ago and the center has become a resource for the visual arts connoisseur, and the historian along with offering a variety of educational programs dedicated to instilling an appreciation of the arts in the next generation.

On the second floor of the center are the permanent galleries. One such gallery space is reserved for the collection of the work of Portsmouth native Clarence Holbrook Carter, known as an American symbolist of the 20th Century. Carter, who studied at the Cleveland School of Art in the early 1920s, went on to set up his studio in New Jersey.

He found much inspiration for his canvases from the rural America of the 1930s that was disenfranchised by the Great Depression. His work is also found in Whitney Museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Carnegie Museum of Art.

“We have the largest collection,” Holbrook-Knox said.

Also on the second floor is the massive collection of artifacts — 10,000 on exhibit ––– of the Hopewell-Adena Indians who inhabited the area from 500 B.C. to A.D. 200 and noted for their large-shaped burial mounds. The collection came about as a byproduct of excavation work of William and Charles Wertz, who came across these artifacts as they were digging for commercial ventures.

“None came from human burial grounds,” Holbrook-Knox said.

In the exhibit can be found projectile points, effigy pipes, necklaces and pottery.

The historical photographs collected by Carl Ackerman of Portsmouth are also among the center’s permanent exhibits. There are 14,000 photographs of the area that span from the last of the 19th Century to the first part of this decade.

Many of them Ackerman, whose hobby was photography, took himself as well as older ones that he acquired. The collection was donated to the center “so the community would have an historical record,” collection curator Kenny Wells said.

There are glass plates, daguerreotype, tintypes and stereo cards. The actual photographs are stored in archival boxes surrounded by acid free paper. However, Wells is putting many of them on the center’s computer, which can be accessed in its library for viewing by the public.

Downstairs in what was once the main lobby of the bank are two galleries that feature traveling exhibits that usually change every three months.

“We have something new and different, but connected to something in the area,” Holbrook-Knox said.

Besides offering exhibits for the more than 24,000 visitors a year to the museum, the center also offers a variety of programs for children from artists in residency programs to Cirque d’Art Theatre.

Cirque is the inspiration of Pegi Wilkes, performing arts curator, who as an aerialist herself is bringing the circus experience to youngsters in the area. The program started nine years ago with 55 students and has grown to 200 student performers. With Cirque the students learn ballet, acrobatics, tumbling, on top of mastering trapeze equipment.

“Children who have never been on a trapeze get to try it out,” Tammy Trinidad, curator of education, said.

Upcoming exhibits at the Southern Ohio Center include Gullah traditionalist folk art carver Lavon Williams until May29; Cream of the Crop 2010, a show of artists living and working within 85 miles of Portsmouth; and Almost Alice: New Illustrations of Wonderland, the digital dreamlike images of Maggie Taylor of the children’s classic.