Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park [CA]

Description

Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park is the site of California’s largest "hydraulic" mine. Visitors can see huge cliffs carved by mighty streams of water, results of the gold mining technique of washing away entire mountains to find the precious metal. Legal battles between mine owners and downstream farmers ended this method. The park also contains a 7,847 foot bedrock tunnel that served as a drain. The visitor center has exhibits on life in the old mining town of North Bloomfield.

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

Hudson River Maritime Museum [NY]

Description

The Hudson River Maritime Museum is the only museum in New York State focusing exclusively on the maritime history of the Hudson River, its tributaries, and the industries that developed around it.

The museum offers both indoor and outdoor exhibits on Hudson maritime history, special events, guided tours of the museum, and boat rides to the historic Roundout Lighthouse. The website offers visitor information, information regarding school tours, and an events calendar.

Anthracite Heritage Museum and Iron Furnaces [PA]

Description

The Museum tells the story of the people who came from Europe to work in the anthracite mining and textiles industries. On a tour of the facility visitors will experience the lives of proud people who endured harsh working conditions yet carved out communities filled with tradition. The diverse collection highlights life in the mines, mills, and factories. Visitors are welcomed into the families' homes and neighborhoods with a moment of reflection in the kitchen, a visit to the pub, or a seat in a local church.

The museum offers exhibits, tours, trolley rides, research library access, and occasional recreational and educational events.

Duke Homestead [NC]

Description

Visitors to the Homestead can see the early home, factories, and farm where Washington Duke first grew and processed tobacco. His sons later founded The American Tobacco Company, the world's largest tobacco company. Duke and others helped create a market for Durham-area tobacco products that eventually would turn North Carolina into the heart of an international tobacco empire. Many profits were invested in land and industries but others were used for such humanitarian causes as Duke University, named for the family. The tour includes the Duke family's restored home, an early factory, a curing barn, and a packhouse. The Tobacco Museum exhibits traces tobacco history from Native American times to the present.

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

California Foundry History Museum [CA]

Description

"Established in 1997, the California Foundry History Institute (CFHI) is a non-profit educational organization incorporated in the state of California and dedicated to the collection and preservation of historical records pertaining to the history of the foundry industry in California." The institute owns and operates two museums in the greater Sacramento area. Both museums offer impressive collections pertaining to California history and the history of the California foundry industry.

The site offers visitor information, a five minute long introductory movie, and a listing of all resources in the institute's archives.

Penfield Museum [NY]

Description

Penfield Museum is a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving the history of the Ironworking industry in upstate New York, and more specifically the Town of Crown Point, New York. The town is now known as the "Birthplace of the Electric Age," since it was the first place where electricity was applied in an industrial use. In addition, the museum also chronicles Crown Point's involvement in the Civil War, both in terms of soldiers and iron provided by the town.

The site offers visitor information, a small 6-photo photograph gallery, brief historical information, and an online gift shop.

Drake Well Museum [PA]

Description

The Drake Well Museum memorializes the site where, in 1859, Edwin L. Drake drilled the oil well that launched the modern petroleum industry. The Museum tells the story of the beginning of the modern oil industry with orientation videos, exhibits, operating oil field machinery, and historic buildings in a park setting.

The museum offers short films, exhibits, tours, educational programs, and research library access.

Century House Historical Society and the Snyder Estate [NY]

Description

The Century House Historical Society preserves the industrial history of the Rosendale natural cement region, operating from the Snyder Estate. The estate began in the early 1800s as a family farm. With the local discovery of natural cement, the site experienced substantial industrial growth until the 1970s.

The society and the estate offer exhibits, tours, and occasional educational and recreational events.

Arthurdale Heritage and New Deal Homestead Museum [WV]

Description

Visitors to Arthurdale, WV can revisit the 1930s. Established in 1933, by the United States government, Arthurdale is the nation's first New Deal Homestead Community. Created through President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal legislation, the community provided a new chance at life for residents of West Virginia who were suffering from the Great Depression. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt served as the empathetic force behind the community, which became known as "Eleanor’s Little Village" because of her interest. Today, Arthurdale is a National Historic District that features 160 of the 165 original homesteads. The New Deal Homestead Museum is a multi-building museum comprised of a forge filled with original tools, a service station reminiscent of a bygone era, the historic Center Hall, the original federal government administration building, and a fully restored Arthurdale homestead.

The museum offers exhibits, tours, and occasional recreational and educational events.

Nantucket Historical Association, Whaling Museum, and Historic Sites [MA]

Description

The Association operates several museums and historic sites, including the Whaling Museum, Hadwen House, Oldest House, Old Mill, Old Gaol, Quaker Meeting House, and the Hose-cart House. The Museum displays exhibits tracing the history of the New England whaling industry. The Hadwen House is a Greek Revival mansion built in 1845 by whaling merchant and silver retailer William Hadwen. Also called the Jethro Coffin House, the Oldest House is the oldest residence on Nantucket. Built as a wedding gift in 1686 for Jethro Coffin and Mary Gardner, it is the sole surviving structure from the island's original 17th-century English settlement. The Old Mill, built in 1746 by Nathan Wilbur, a Nantucket sailor who had spent time in Holland, is the oldest functioning mill in the country. The Old Gaol was opened in 1806; the wooden structure represents colonial architecture with exceptional reinforcements. The Quaker (Friends) Meeting House was erected in 1838 and originally served as a Friends School for the Wilburite Sect. The Fire Hose-cart House is the last remaining 19th-century firehouse on the island, dating from 1886.

The association offers tours, lectures, classes, research library access, and recreational and educational events; the Museum offers exhibits; the Hadwen House offers tours; the Oldest House offers tours; the Old Mill offers tours and demonstrations; the Old Gaol is open to the public; the Quaker Meeting House is open to the public and offers lectures; the Hose-cart House is open to the public.