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

The Slaughter Ranch [AZ]

Description

The Slaughter Ranch is a 19th century ranch once owned by "Texas" John Slaughter, a powerful cattle rancher and legendary sheriff in modern day Arizona. The 1893 ranch consists of a five bedroom ranch house, an ice house, a wash house, a granary, a commissary, and a car shed.

Groups may tour the house and grounds, as well as use the designated picnic area.

Braintree Historical Society, Sylvanus Thayer Birthplace, and Museum [MA]

Description

The Braintree Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Braintree, MA and its people. To this end, the society operates the Gilbert Bean Museum of local history, a research library, and the Sylvanus Thayer Birthplace. The research library collections include town records dating from 1640 onward, archival materials, and a display of military artifacts. Thayer (1785-1872) advocated engineering education, and is known as the "father of West Point." His birthplace holds exhibits on the railway, military history, and coopers, as well as circa 1785 period rooms.

The society offers exhibits, period rooms, guided tours of the Thayer house, and research library access. Appointments are necessary for all visits, with the exception of Thayer house tours taking place April through November.

Roth Living Farm Museum [PA]

Description

The Roth Living Farm Museum demonstrates farming as practiced between 1890 and 1910. Demonstrations include sheep shearing, milking, washing laundry, egg collecting, cheese making, butter churning, corn grinding, and planting. Animals on site include horses, chickens, sheep, goats, and cattle. The farm consists of an 1832 Georgian farmhouse, 19th-century barn, and 35 surrounding acres.

The museum offers traditional and interactive demonstrations, Scout programs, summer tours, and group tours and activities. Group tours and hands-on activities can be scheduled throughout the year.

Frederick County Landmarks Foundation [MD]

Description

The Frederick County Landmarks Foundation maintains two historic sites, the Beatty-Cramer House Site and the Schifferstadt Architectural Museum. The Beatty-Cramer House is the oldest home in Frederick County, dating back to 1732. The Schifferstadt Architectural Museum is colonial German stone house built in 1758. Both sites teach about Frederick County's local history and architecture, focusing on the era of the French and Indian War.

The Beatty-Cramer House offers school tours and occasional education programs. The Schifferstadt Architectural Museum offers occasional educational programs for students and specialized lesson plans for 3rd and 4th grade Maryland teachers.

Ogeechee Canal Museum & Nature Center

Description

The Ogeechee Canal Museum and Nature Center showcases a 19th century Southern canal built in 1930. The canal was an important mean of transporting lumber, cotton, rice, bricks, guano, naval stores, and peaches until the advent of the railroad in America.

The site offers guided trail walks that focus on canal history, ecology, or wildlife. Living history programs on canal workers or 19th century schooling are also offered. Two hands-on Outdoor Classroom programs are available that teach about canal archeology and construction.

Colonel Davenport Historical Foundation [IL]

Description

The Colonel Davenport Historical Foundation maintains the Federal-style 1833 house of George Davenport, a colonel in the US Army. The house was built as an outpost for the US government in the process of expanding and exploring the West. Davenport spent time as a fur-trader while living in the home and the site's interpretation reflects the home's settler history.

The museum offers guided tours by trained docents for school groups. The site also offers a travelling trunk filled with pre-visit activities for use a week before a field trip.