We’ve received some fabulous donations this year for the museum so we can do some fun event planning! Our previously mostly empty room that served during the 1800’s and 1900’s as a post office, telegraph office, telephone switchboard room, and Union Civil war payroll office is getting some new items that have been generously donated this year. Now we just need to do some minor moving around of things and some TLC clean up and repairs in that room to get it all looking beautiful and ready for next years visitors!
We are working to set it up as a really fun spot to stop by for a special surprise (or two or three lol) fun event(s) to be later announced. So stay tuned for more information on that! But I just had to show off some of those wonderful donations!
One of the donations is the most beautiful hand woven circa 1800’s blanket that I have ever seen! We have that on display in the museum on our new quilt rack. It’s just lovely if you are a fiber artist aficionado it is a must see item. This is something unique! This donation was made by the Gilcrest family in memory of Jane Gilcrest one of WV’s renowned hand weavers.
We also received a fabulous corn sheller which will be added to our grain grinding hands on learning events once we complete some TLC repairs and cleaning on that piece. So that’s a future project in the works too! We love to get the corn shellers out for everyone to get the feel of how those worked! This is for our hands on learning activities 🙂 and was donated to the museum by the Speer family.
Another addition is a wood working shave pony for our hands on learning wood working shop we are attempting to gather supplies for in order to open up that shop next year 😀 this one actually made me giggle with joy when we got it (honestly all the new display items and other donations made me giggle with joy!) and hubby right away made me a new broom using the shave horse! I’ve been asking for that broom for a couple years now lol! This beautiful shave pony/horse was donated by the Randolph family in memory of Charlie Randolph.
But… for the post office and telegraph room (works in progress) I have to share some photos of our newly donated post office boxes and telegraph machine. I see some post cards and Morse code hands on learning events in the future! The telegraph machine is on loan from the Yenchik family, and the post office boxes were donated by the Vance family.
We have to be the luckiest museum in the world, with all our wonderful volunteers and all the people donating items or loaning us items to make this a fun free family friendly place to come spend the day. If anyone has a small telephone switchboard they would like to donate… we are looking for one of those next 🙂 and in the mean time let me tempt you with these lovely pieces of historical significance! These just have me itching to tap out some Morse code messages and write a letter home!
Oh! And I forgot to mention our newly acquired butter churn! What fun! Now if I can just find a dairy farmer willing to donate some milk we will be in business for a little hands on butter churning practice 🙂 this beautiful butter churn is on loan to the museum from the Kimball family in memory of Carol Kimball.
We also received three truck loads full of crafting supplies from the Kimball family in memory their late mother Carol Kimball. Which will be greatly enjoyed by all and make our hands on learning center the best ever!
Now I’m off to go do some work to get these new pieces cleaned and all set in their new homes for your viewing and hands on learning pleasure! Remember to plan your camping trip or day trip to stop by and see us next year at Bulltown Historical Area and Museum at the beautiful Burnsville lake in West Virginia. Also check the Burnsville Lake Facebook page to see what fun events we plan for each month at the historical area so you can plan accordingly. Thanks to our generous donors and wonderful volunteer staff we can keep all our demonstrations and hands on learning events free and open to the public 😀 if you have a donation (or loan) of crafting supplies or antique tools or other items please contact the museum staff and our volunteers will be happy to assist you.
Conestoga Chuck 