Audubon State Historic Site [LA]

Description

The Audubon State Historic Site is located in St. Francisville, LA, and is the site where noted artist John Audubon stayed for four months while teaching art to Eliza Pirrie. The Pirries lived in the Oakley House, which is a fabulous example of colonial architecture in the deep south. The Oakley House is listed on the national register of historic places.

The site offers guided tours of the Oakley House, galleries of Audubon's art, and exhibits regarding Audubon's stay. The website offers a brief history of the site and visitor information.

Chippokes Plantation State Park and Museum [VA]

Description

The 1,683-acre Chippokes Plantation State Park contains a working plantation site, founded circa 1619. The site's main residence is known as the Jones-Stewart Mansion. The plantation grounds house gardens and the Chippokes Farm and Forestry Museum, which presents circa 1850 Virginian farming life. Exhibits include farm building, soil preparation, planting, cultivating, harvesting, blacksmiths' tools, wheelwrights' tools, cobblers' tools, coopers' tools, farm animals, processing, preserving, small tools, and house ware. Many exhibits depict the evolution of tools used for a particular task. Collection highlights include a wooden tooth cultivator and a plow, designed to be pulled by oxen.

The park offers exhibits, mansion tours, an interpretive forestry trail, guided group museum tours, curriculum-based museum educational programs, recreational trails, outdoor activities, overnight facilities, a snack bar, and a picnic complex. Mansion tours and museum access are available April through October. Picnic shelters can be reserved. The snack bar operates Memorial Day through Labor Day. The museum can customize educational programs.

San Juan Capistrano Historical Society and O'Neill Museum [CA]

Description

The San Juan Capistrano Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of San Juan Capistrano, California. To this end, the society operates the O'Neill Museum, a circa 1880 home. The structure was once the residence of a saloon owner, and is now furnished to an 1880s appearance.

The society offers period rooms, 90-minute walking tours, archival access, and oral histories.

The Allamakee County Historical Society and Museum [IA]

Description

The The Allamakee County Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Allamakee County, Iowa. To this end, the society operates a historic courthouse, which holds a museum of local history and the restored courtroom.

The society offers exhibits, a period room, and museum tours. The museum is open between June and October, as well as by appointment.

Salmon Brook Historical Society and Museums [CT]

Description

The Salmon Brook Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Granby, Connecticut. To this end, the society operates four museum buildings. The circa 1732 Abijah Rowe House has been restored to an early 1800s interior appearance. It also houses a collection of Victorian toys. The circa 1790 Weed-Enders House houses the society research library and a Victorian parlor. The circa 1870 Cooley School House has been furnished and styled to a 19th-century appearance. The circa 1914 Colton-Hayes Tobacco Barn offers a recreated Shaker meeting house; town microcosm; and exhibits on vernacular items, Native American artifacts, and the Civil War.

The society offers exhibits, period rooms, and library access. The museum buildings are open between June and September. Reservations are required for groups.

Fort Toulouse / Fort Jackson State Historic Site [AL]

Description

History is alive and outside at Fort Toulouse-Fort Jackson. Here Native Americans, Spanish explorers, French soldiers, English and Scottish traders, American settlers, and modern archaeologists have all left their mark. Frequent living history events showcase a recreated 1751 French fort, recreated Creek Indian houses, and the partially restored 1814 American Fort Jackson. A 3,000-year-old Mississipian Indian mound, the William Bartram Nature Trail, and an early 19th-century house weave even more strands into this colorful tapestry of Alabama's earliest days.

Two other websites for the site exist: a second general website here and a website for the site's living history programs here.

The site offers exhibits, tours, and occasional recreational and educational events (including living history events).

Walpole Historical Society [MA]

Description

The Walpole Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Walpole, Massachusetts. The society is located within the 1826 Deacon Willard Lewis House. Artifacts on view include historic furnishings; military items; and children's books, toys, and clothing.

The society offers exhibits and archival access.

Old State House Museum [AR]

Description

The Old State House Museum, housed within the 1842 Greek Revival former state capitol building, presents the history of the state of Arkansas and its residents. The structure served as the state capitol until 1911; both a Confederate and Union capitol; a medical school and research site; and a popular campaign site of Bill Clinton (born 1946), 42nd President of the United States. Period rooms include a 1901 through 1906 parlor, 1870 through 1900 parlor, a 1750 through 1800 library, an 1860 through 1870 Rococo Revival parlor, an 1836 through 1860 library, and 1836 through 1885 House of Representatives chamber. Permanent exhibits address 19th- and 20th-century women's lives, the building's construction, Bill Clinton, hands-on 1930s artifacts, early 19th-century life, Arkansas governors and their families, and 1819 through 1919 Arkansas political history.

The museum offers exhibits, period rooms, hourly guided tours, self-guided tours, eight thematic tours for students, outreach programs for students and adults, educational programs for students or adults, living history characters, a summer camp, teacher's workshops, and traveling trunks. Groups of 12 or more must make reservations for guided tours. Living history characters can be scheduled into tours with advance notice. The website offers virtual exhibits, lesson plans, activities, games, and crosswords.

Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and the Highlands [NY]

Description

The Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and the Highlands seeks to preserve and share the history of the Newburgh area, New York. To this end, the society operates the 1830 neoclassical Captain David Crawford House, once home to an major local maritime entrepreneur. The house presents 19th-century upper class life and the histories of Newburgh and the Hudson River Valley. Society collections include furnishings, decorative arts, archival documents, and fine arts. Highlights include 18th-century furnishings, a Duncan Phyfe settee, and Hudson River School paintings.

The society offers tours and research library access. Appointments are required for library access.

Old Island Restoration Foundation and the Oldest House [FL]

Description

The Old Island Restoration Foundation is primarily concerned with architectural preservation within Key West, Florida. However, the organization also operates the 1829 Oldest House museum. The residence was once home to a customs inspector, lightship captain, and wrecker. Wreckers were men who would race to shipwrecks in order to save the crews and to collect a portion of the cargo as their own. The museum holds furnishings, maritime artifacts, wrecker artifacts, ship models, and items once lost at sea. The structure itself is the oldest in South Florida, hence the name.

The museum offers exhibits and gardens.