Stan Kann in 1990; his death left a vacuum.

Memo to the St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission:

May we suggest that you update your promotional literature to make the claim that “St. Louis is the Gateway to Suction Tourism”?

Oh, sure there’s the Arch, the museums, the sports teams, the parks, the brewery and all that, but last week came word that the region will soon be home to two world-class collections of vintage vacuum cleaners.

(Insert your own “suck” joke here).

On Thursday, the Vacuum Cleaner Museum opened in St. James, Mo., just 90 minutes southwest of St. Louis in Phelps County. St. James, which boasts the “prettiest little city hall in Missouri,” was well worth the drive even before the museum opened, if only for the trout fishing at Maramec Spring Park. Now what with 500 vintage vacuums to study, you can really make a day of it.

And then came word that the Fox Theatre’s Mary Strauss hopes to install 70 vacuums from the late Stan Kann’s collection at the City Museum downtown.

Do not underestimate the appeal of vacuum cleaners, nor the competition from other pretenders to the suction tourism throne. North Canton, Ohio, has its own museum, as does Portland, Ore. We cannot pretend to know why.