Underground Gold Miners Museum [CA]

Description

The Underground Gold Miners Museum presents the history of Alleghany, California and its mining district; the Sixteen to One Mine; and area geology. Areas of focus include underground hardrock mining technology and equipment, as well as the lives of California's underground gold miners. The Sixteen to One Mine remained an active gold mine between circa 1896 and 1965.

The museum offers exhibits, and is open for special events and by appointment only.

Strawberry Banke Museum [NH]

Description

The Strawberry Banke Museum is a living history museum of one of New Hampshire’s oldest neighborhoods and its history that dates back to the 1600's. The outdoor museum contains 42 historic buildings, the earliest build in 1695, and many contain live demonstrations of craftsmanship, cooking, and other forms of daily life at work.

School groups can tour the neighborhood on their own and partake in a Time Travel Workshop that includes hands-on activities lasting about 90 minutes on a specific, curriculum-based topic. Other programs on architecture, archeology, cooking, Early America, Trade and Maritime history, and the Industrial revolution meet New Hampshire education standards for many grade levels. The site also offers programs for home-schoolers and holiday programs.

Naval Undersea Museum [WA]

Description

The Naval Undersea Museum presents information on the oceans and marine technology. Permanent exhibit topics include the physics and biological aspects of the world's oceans, torpedoes, mine warfare, civilian and military diving gear, and submarines. The museum torpedo display is the largest in the country. Collection highlights include a Confederate marine mine.

The museum offers films, audio, exhibits, hands-on activities, and speakers. Offerings for students include focus tours, art projects, construction projects, gallery tours, films, and a youth docent program.

Matheson Museum [FL]

Description

The Matheson Museum consists of four entities—the Matheson Museum, Matheson House, Tison Tool Museum, and Sweetwater Park. The Matheson Museum presents the history of Alachua County, FL. Permanent exhibits address the Timucuan; Spanish occupation; and Willam Bartram, 18th-century botanist. The 1867 Matheson House has been restored to period style. It is used to discuss the history of Gainesville, FL and the family which once owned the home. The Tilson Tool Museum presents historic tools, and honors the labor which was exerted to create Alachua County's structures. Sweetwater Park is an outdoor site which provides a brief overview of Gainesville history.

The museum offers period rooms, exhibits, guided tours, interactive tours for students, group tours, and research services. The Matheson House and Tilson Tool Museum are open by appointment only. Reservations are required for group and student tours. A fee is charged for one hour of research conducted upon request. The website offers a curriculum guide.

Eagle Island State Historic Site [ME]

Description

The Eagle Island State Historic Site preserves the summer home of Admiral Robert Peary (1856-1920), who after his 1909 expedition, claimed to be the first man to reach the geographic North Pole. The grounds contain gardens originally tended by Peary's wife, Josephine.

The site offers house tours, a hiking trail, gardens, and picnicking opportunities. The site is entirely inaccessible by wheelchair.

Jacobsburg National Historic District [PA]

Description

The Jacobsburg National Historic District preserves the site where the Henry Rifle was made, and serves as a center for environmental education. Historic buildings are open for tours. The Henrys manufactured small arms for both the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, as well as being the primary firearms supplier for John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company.

The district offers educational programs for students, teacher workshops, public programs, 18.5 miles of hiking and multi-use trails, outdoor activities, living history events, gunmaking demonstrations, gunmaking and blacksmithing classes, building tours, and a picnic area. The park recommends that visitors dress in blaze orange during hunting season.

Old City Cemetery and Museums [VA]

Description

The Old City Cemetery is the oldest public cemetery in Virginia, in continuous operation since 1806. The site includes the Mourning Museum, Pest House Medical Museum, Hearse House and Cemetery Caretaker's Museum, Station House, and Chapel and Columbarium. The Station House is furnished in a circa World War I style. The Hearse House contains a circa 1900 hearse and a variety of cemetery caretaker tools. The Mourning Museum presents 19th- and 20th-century mourning attire, jewelry, and etiquette, as well as the history of coffins and embalming. Topics relevant to the site include horticulture, symbolism, ironwork, Civil War medicine, mourning practices of the Victorian era, railways, African American history, the founding of Lynchburg, women, archaeology, and local disasters. The cemetery has been in use since 1806.

The cemetery offers self-guided tours; period rooms; exhibits; Mourning Museum tours; interior tours of the Pest House, Hearse House, Station House, and Chapel; audio tours; customizable guided cemetery tours; and wayside signs. Appointments are required for interior tours of the Pest House, Hearse House, Station House, and Chapel, as well as for guided cemetery tours. The website offers lesson plans, brief descriptions of notable figures interred on site, a virtual African American history tour, and brief informative articles.

Kona Historical Society [HI]

Description

The Kona Historical Society's Coffee Living History Farm is typical of a Japanese coffee pioneer's life in Hawaii during the period between 1920 and 1945. Crops such as coffee and macadamia nuts are still grown and farm animals such as donkeys and chickens are part of the farm experience. A coffee mill is still used to grind the coffee grown on the farm and the product is in the historic General Store.

A 75-min village walking tour is offered as well as hands-on activities such as clothes washing, bread-making, coffee grinding, etc. are offered to give students an idea of the labor involved in running a farm. Interpretive performances can be performed in schools and outreach trunk shows are offered for in-class presentations. Teacher resources are sold by the society for a minimal charge.

Empire Mine State Historic Park [CA]

Description

Empire Mine State Historic Park is the site of one of the oldest, largest, deepest, longest, and richest gold mines in California. In existence for more than 100 years, the mine produced 5.6 million ounces of gold before it closed in 1956. The park contains many of the mine's buildings, the owner's home. and restored gardens, as well as the entrance to 367 miles of abandoned and flooded mine shafts.

The park offers exhibits, tours, living history presentations and events, and occasional recreational and educational events.