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Preserving and displaying the history of Adams County, Wisconsin |
The McGowan House Museum is open Saturdays for tours June through September 1:00-4:00PM.
The Heritage Center is open for research, genealogy, book shopping and all kinds of Adams County historical information Tuesdays and Thursdays from Noon to 5:00 pm.
Great crowd for our Holiday Party. Thank you to all who attended and donated. Your generosity keeps us going.
The Holidays are for sharing with Family & Friends. Our volunteers are looking forward to this time off. We wish all of you a Merry Christmas 🎄 & Happy New Year 🎊.
Harriet Dehlinger as Katherine McGowan
Dale Reich as George Bingham
PJ Eigner as “Tex” Reddick
Hannah & April Eggersdorf as the Bassett Sisters
After nearly three years in the making, our Adams County History Museum is now open.
It has been a long journey.
It started with our elevator and the fund-raising necessary to install it. Over a period of three years, our supporters contributed over $180,000 for the elevator, plus a handicap-accessible bathroom and other remodeling at our Heritage Center.
It continued with the commissioning of the professionally produced Adams County, Of Place and Time video history of our county. It was completed early in 2020, just before the Covid pandemic forced us to close our sites to the public.
We then decided to make lemonade out of lemons and use the down time to set up our museum. After two and a half years of researching, collecting, building and preparing photos, art and artifacts for display, we are ready to open.
Anyone who visits our Heritage Center can reach the Museum the old-fashioned way, up the front stairway or via our new elevator. Donors to the Elevator Fund can take pride in riding in what they helped to purchase and install. Before getting in the elevator, they can look for their names mounted on the Elevator Fund Donors Door. It is our way o saying Thank You.
A museum tour starts with a viewing of the Of Place and Time video, which summarizes our county history in 22 minutes. You can see it on the big screen downstairs.
Upstairs, visitors will find two large galleries containing 28 separate exhibits. They range from the “Glacial Legacy” to the “Ho Chunk Return” to “The Origin of County Place Names” and more in one gallery. The second gallery has exhibits on “Village Life,” “The Railroad,” “Parades and Festivals,” “A-F Speedway,” ‘Leading Women” and more. Another entire room is devoted to the men and women from our county who have served in the military from the Civil War to today.
In addition, there are dozens of extra-large photos and maps mounted on the walls around the building, as well as mini-exhibits both upstairs and down.
We have not counted them all, but we estimate that we have several hundred photos, works of art and artifacts on display.
Adams County may be a “small” place, but it has a big history. We have done our best to exhibit it.
Heritage Center’s new elevator
Step inside and press 2 to enter the Adams County History Museum
Split Black Ash basket made by Maude Decorah
E Nuk Ka Ho No Kah, Maude Decorah with her son Joshua Sanford
Traditional Bohemian Costume
<1881>
St. Leo’s Catholic Church
in Friendship
Celebration at Bohemian Hall (Initials are for the Czech words)
The Friendship State Bank lives again
The Friendship State Bank was the first bank in Adams County. The bank was housed in the Gunning-Purvis Office Building in Friendship that is now the Adams County Historical Society’s Adams County Heritage Center. The bank opened in 1910, soon after the building opened. The bank closed in 1936 during the depression as did many, but the old bank vault and the safe inside it remained. The ornate cage that the tellers stood behind and dealt with depositors behind the bars was taken out when the bank closed. It was ruined some years later in storage.
Now an antique bank cage was found and installed. The new cage makes the book shop in the Center look like it could be a set for a 1930’s movie.
The book is 934 pages, with 600 photographs and images. Because the book is intended as a research source, the author has provided over 10,000 endnotes to guide the reader to additional resources. An extensive index is provided.
Volume One of the book presents a history of the village through subject categories, such a education, health care, government, lifestyle, and the early geologic history of the area.
Volume Two of the book presents a history of the village through a block-by-block review of the businesses that operated in the village from its inception in 1856.
Friendship, Wisconsin – A History.
Adams County Historical Society, PO BOX 264, Friendship, WI 53934
If you are not local and would like to purchase the set, leave your contact information so that we can contact you about purchasing a copy of the set.
The price is $150 for the two volume set plus $50 shipping.
