Wisconsin Historical Society

Description

The Wisconsin Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of the state of Wisconsin. To this end, the society operates the Wisconsin Historical Museum. Permanent exhibits include frontier and immigration history, as well as Native American life. The Native American exhibit includes an Aztalan-style house, which visitors are welcome to enter. Collections consist of more than 110,000 objects and 400,000 artifacts.

The museum offers exhibits, films, interactive audio-visual presentations, full-scale dioramas, workshops, storytelling, lectures, demonstrations, an activity-based self-guided tour, guided tours, hands-on activities, and educational programs in compliance with state educational standards. Reservations are required for school groups and for use of the lunchroom. The society also offers archaeology traveling trunks and outreach presentations for second through fourth grade students. The website offers an extensive state historical database, lesson plans, information on National History Day programming, virtual exhibits, an educational framework on historical thinking, educational games, a fourth-grade textbook, and exhibit-related teachers' guides.

Farmers' Museum [NY]

Description

The Farmer's Museum is an outdoor historical museum which presents the rural heritage of the U.S. Key features include an 1840s village, heritage gardens, and the Lippitt Farmstead. The farm site includes heritage breeds of sheep, turkeys, and cattle, as well as a farmhouse, barns, a granary, a hop house, a smokehouse, and a poultry house. An interactive 1910 county fair is on the grounds on a seasonal basis. Collections consist of over 23,000 artifacts including wallpaper, textiles, and a particularly strong showing of historical woodworking tools.

The museum offers period rooms, gardens, hands-on activities, demonstrations, historic skill workshops, lectures, educational children's programs, a children's interpretation program, and guided tours for groups. Two weeks advance notice is required for group tours. The website offers a museum blog.

Woodlawn Museum [ME]

Description

Woodlawn Museum is a historic home, containing its original furnishings. Collections include both European and American art, furniture, carriages, and sleighs. Completed in 1827, Woodlawn housed a major area timber and land dealing family.

The museum offers guided tours, period rooms, free croquet lessons, an annual lecture series, a hands-on historic game library, and gardens. All special events include children's activities. Reservations are required for school tours. Picnic lunches are welcome on grounds. The website offers children's activities.

Matthew Edel Blacksmith Shop [IA]

Description

This uniquely preserved blacksmith shop is exactly as German immigrant Matthew Edel left it the day he died. Edel, a skilled blacksmith and inventor, operated the shop until his death in 1940. Visitors can see his tools and wares and hear stories about blacksmithing during the age before tractors and automobiles.

The site offers tours and demonstrations.

Vincennes State Historic Sites [IN]

Description

The Vincennes State Historic Sites commemorate Indiana's early state history—with the city itself founded in 1732. Structures include the 1805 Indiana Territory capital building; a historic print shop; the birthplace of the author Maurice Thompson; an 1838 bank; Fort Knox II, hospital to the wounded of the Battle of Tippecanoe; the 1801 Jefferson Academy; and a prehistoric burial mound. Maurice Thompson (1844-1901) authored 1900's bestselling romance novel, Alice of Old Vincennes. Topics covered include slavery, military life, domestic life, historical sciences, the fur trade.

The sites offer period rooms, educational outreach programs, group tours, educational presentations, interpretive signage, educational programs, lesson plans, and summer camps.

Isham-Terry House [CT]

Description

The Isham-Terry House is a time capsule of genteel life in turn-of-the century Hartford. Dr. Oliver Isham bought the 1854 Italianate Villa in 1896. Here he had his physician's office and lived with his sisters Julia and Charlotte. Julia and Charlotte occupied the house until the 1970s, defying the urban renewal juggernaut that demolished so many historic homes. The sisters made so few changes and modernizations to the house that crossing its threshold today is like stepping back in time. Room after room is filled with objects of historical and family significance: ornate gaslight fixtures; stained-glass windows; rare books and paintings; Connecticut-made clocks; and memorabilia from Hartford High School, the Ishams' alma mater. Even Dr. Isham's office, with surgical instruments and medicines, was left undisturbed. Dr. Isham also possessed a rare collection of early Connecticut automobile memorabilia.

The house offers exhibits and tours.

History Center of Stamford [CT]

Description

The History Center of Stamford presents the history of Stamford, Connecticut. To this end, the society operates a research library, archives, an exhibition gallery, and the circa 1765 Hoyt Barnum House. This residence was home to the children or grandchildren of Stamford's founders. Furnishings date to the 17th and 18th centuries.

The center offers exhibits, library access, and period rooms. The Hoyt Barnum House is open by appointment. The website offers a selection of historical images and a virtual tour of the Hoyt Barnum House.

Fort Vasquez Museum [CO]

Description

Visitors to the site of this 1835 fur-trading fort can follow the paths of founders Louis Vasquez and Andrew Sublette. The traders employed many of their mountain-man friends, including Baptiste Charbonneau and Jim Beckwourth, at their adobe outpost on the South Platte River.

The museum offers exhibits, tours, and educational programs.

Huntington Historical Society and Historic Structures [NY]

Description

The Huntington Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Huntington, New York. To that end, the society operates four historical structures: the 1795 Dr. Daniel Kissam House Museum, 1750 David Conklin Farmhouse, Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Building, and the Huntington Sewing and Trade School. The trade school building, which housed one of the United States' earliest vocational schools, now holds the society's library.

The Dr. Daniel Kissam House Museum offers period rooms and exhibits, while the David Conklin Farmhouse offers guided tours and period rooms in Colonial, Federal, and Victorian styles. The Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Building offers exhibits. The society also offers interactive educational outreach programs with slide presentations, interactive educational programs led by costumed interpreters and aligned with state educational standards, day camps, lectures, after-school programs, and outreach lectures. The Dr. Daniel Kissam House Museum is open by appointment only, and reservations are required for group tours of the David Conklin Farmhouse. Students may use the archives free of charge.

Historical Museum at St. Gertrude [ID]

Description

The Historical Museum at St. Gertrude presents the history of North Central Idaho. Collections include more than 10,000 archival materials; 150 years of textiles; weaponry, some of which was used in the 1877 Nez Perce War; Nez Perce artifacts; a range of historic office machinery, including a 1902 Burroughs “Moon Hopkins” bookkeeping machine and an 1895 Dactyle calculator; world minerals; mining equipment; medical artifacts, including a 1900 fetal monitor and a tonsillectomy chair; and artifacts of Chinese immigrants. The museum also owns many of Polly Bemis' previous possessions. Bemis (1853-1933), originally from China, was brought to an Idaho mining camp as a female slave. Roughly 12,000 artifacts, some of which date to the 14th century, are on display.

The museum offers exhibits