Coopersville Area Historical Society and Museum [MI]

Description

The Coopersville Area Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Coopersville, MI. To this end, the society operates a museum of local history. The museum is housed within two structures, one of which is an early 20th-century railway depot. Exhibit topics include sawmills, settler lifestyles, rock music, logging, and business. Period settings include an early 20th-century school room and an 1880s drugstore. The museum contains a memorial to rock and roll singer Del Shannon (1934-1990).

The museum offers exhibits, period rooms, and group tours. Reservations are required for group tours.

Colonial Williamsburg [VA]

Description

Colonial Williamsburg is the world's single largest living history museum. It consists of the reconstructed 18th-century British outpost of Williamsburg, VA. Through costumed interpreters and structures furnished to period, the museum shares the story of America and its people—Native American, African American, Caucasian, enslaved, indentured, and free—circa 1699 through 1780. The historic area includes political and residential sites, trade skill settings, a plantation, gardens, and animal breeds of circa 200 years ago. Museums on site include the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum and the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum.

The site offers exhibits, period rooms, living history interpreters, demonstrations, walking tours, dramatic performances, military exercises, fife and drum parades, ghost walks, mock witch trials, films, lectures, music programs, reenactments, a teacher institute in early American history, children's activities, curriculum-based tours for students, museum tours, conferences, forums, workshops, concession stands, and several dining locations with period-inspired food. The website offers audio tours, a virtual tour, virtual exhibits, information on historical structures and people, information on aspects of daily life, recipes, electronic field trips, lesson plans, teaching resources for purchase, slide shows, videos, audio clips, a daily vocabulary feature, podcasts, blogs, activities and games, and journal excerpts

Walton House Museum [OH]

Description

The Walton House Museum presents the daily life of people in the Dayton, OH area between circa 1850 and the early 20th century. The 1838 Walton House holds period rooms displaying domestic life between 1850 and the early 1900s, in addition to fan, buttonhook, and patterned glass exhibits. The grounds contain a flower and perennial garden and a medicine garden. The latter consists of medicinal herbs ordered by a doctor in 1844. Gardens which produced herbs for local doctors were common between 1820 and 1850.

The museum offers exhibits, period rooms, gardens, and guided tours for students.

McDowell House and Apothecary Shop [KY]

Description

The McDowell House and Apothecary Shop is the site of the first successful ovarian tumor removal, completed in 1809. The surgeon and resident of the home was Ephraim McDowell (1771-1830). The earliest portions of the Georgian structure itself date to circa 1795. The site includes the residence and restored apothecary shop, which contains 18th- and 19th-century artifacts. The site offers information on early 19th-century life and medicine.

The site offers 45-minute guided grounds tours and 45-minute guided tours of the home and apothecary shop. The apothecary shop and second floor of the residence are not wheelchair accessible. Videos are available to individuals unable to visit these areas in person. School groups are welcome with advance notice. The website offers an activity guide.

Dr. Willella Howe-Waffle House and Medical Museum [CA]

Description

The Dr. Willella Howe-Waffle House and Medical Museum is located within an 1889 Queen Anne Victorian residence. The site was once home to Alvin and Willella Howe, both physicians. Graduating in 1886, Willella Howe was one of Orange County, California's earliest female doctors. After Alvin Howe was accused of performing an abortion, he left the area. Willella divorced him and married a local rancher, Edson Waffle. The house has been restored to a circa 1890s appearance.

The house offers period rooms.

Person County Museum of History

Description

The museum complex includes the Kitchin House, the Male Academy/Parsonage, Woodsdale General Store, Dr. John H. Merritt's office, a tobacco barn, and the Van Hook Subscription School, which is believed to be the oldest in the state. Variety is the emphasis of the museum with something for everyone from sports fans to doll lovers. The Enos Slaughter display honoring the Roxboro native and Hall of Famer features a replica of a statue depicting his winning slide in the 1946 World Series while the Victorian Wedding Room showcases a wedding party of dolls in full wedding garb. Other exhibits focus on Black history; Native Americans; the Titanic; and the military, with uniforms from all branches of the service in all the wars from the American Revolution to Vietnam. Displays are updated often and special commemorative events including historical reenactments are held throughout the year.

The museum offers exhibits, tours, and occasional living history events.

Jarrell Plantation Historic Site [GA]

Description

The Jarrell Plantation Historic Site is a historic cotton plantation. The main plantation residence was built in 1847, and many of the furnishings within are those made by the original owner, John Fitz Jarrell. Jarrell's descendants later transitioned the plantation's industry to wood products.

The site offers period rooms, tours, and summer camps.

Mount Desert Island Historical Society and Museums [ME]

Description

The Mount Desert Island Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Mount Desert Island, ME from 1761 to present. To this end, the society operates the 1892 Old School House and Museum, the Farm Stand at the Old School House, the Somesville Historical Museum and Gardens, and the Selectman's Building and Bridge. The Farm Stand presents transportation, craft, and agricultural artifacts. The Somesville Historical Museum grounds contain an heirloom garden. The Selectman's Building, erected in the 1780s, now houses displays on cobbling.

The society offers exhibits, period rooms, gardens, an 1894 school day program for third and fourth grade students, and children's activities. Guests wishing to see the Old School House and Museum in June should call ahead to verify that the site will be open when they plan to visit. The Selectman's Building is open July through September.

Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame and Museum [MS]

Description

The Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame and Museum commemorates figures and processes crucial to or exemplary of Mississippi sportsmanship. Museum exhibit topics include sports broadcasting; Dizzy Dean (1910-1974), famed baseball pitcher; major sports figures; Mississippi Olympic medal winners; sports medicine; high school athletes; golf; soccer; baseball; and football. Several exhibits encourage active participation.

The museum offers an 11-minute introductory film, interactive and traditional exhibits, scavenger hunts for groups, and food service for groups. Reservations are suggested for groups of 12 or more. Advance notice is required for food service.

Highlands Historical Society and Historic Village [NC]

Description

The Highlands Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Highlands, North Carolina, founded in 1875. To this end, the society operates the Historic Village, which consists of the 1877 House-Trapier-Wright Home, 1908 Bug Hill Cottage, and the Highlands Historical Museum and Archives. The House-Trapier-Wright Home serves as a living history museum. The Bug Hill Cottage is an open-air cubicle once used to house and treat tuberculosis patients. 60 such cubicles once existed at the sanatorium on site. The historical museums exhibits address women's lives, moonshine, historic structures, genealogy, education, religion, and the area tuberculosis sanatorium, among other topics.

The society offers exhibits, period rooms, and living history interpretation.