Last updated: 5/10/2010
37 E 375 N
Rochester, IN 46975
37 E. 375 North
Rochester, IN 46975
Monday - Saturday
9 AM - 5 PM
Closed holidays.
Free, but donations are accepted & appreciated
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Melnda Clinger
phone: 574-223-4436
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Lola Riddle
phone:
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Peggy Van Meter
phone:
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Annette Wise
phone:
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Shirley Willard
phone:
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Gift shop has books and crafts by local people and Indians. Rental includes 2 kitchens and 2 meeting rooms. Grunds can also be rented, including Trail of Courge area in woods by Tippecanoe River with 35 wooden booths and 2 cabins.
FCHS depends on volunteers to host the museum and do a lot of the work, produce its festivals, gather history. We have 3 big festivals: Redbud Trail Rendezvous the last weekend of April, Historical Power Show third weekend of June, and Trail of Courage Living History Festival third weekend of September. We have 4 branches: Genealogy Section that publishes Fulton County Folk Finder, Potawatomi Trail of Death Assn. that erected historical markers & highway signs on 660 mile 1838 Trail of Death from Indiana to Kansas, Fulton County Historical Power Assn. that produces the antique tractor & power show, and Blacksmiths that teach ironworking the second Saturday of each month in blacksmith shop on FCHS grounds.
Founded in 1963, got 1876 Rochester Depot as first museum in 1969, bought 35 acres for site of new museum in 1985, built new museum in 1988, moved & restored 1924 round barn in 1991, moved & restored 1832 William Polke house - stagecoach inn in 1993, moved & restored 11 other buildings to create living history village called Loyal, Indiana in the next 7 years, built 40 foot addition to meeting room & reference room in 2001, built 100 foot meeting room as Richland Center Memorial Hall in 2008. All built with donations and money earned from festivals and sales of books, etc.
Farm implemetns, tools and horse-drawn transportation in round barn. In museum: 17 rooms: Old Time Kitchen, dining room, bedroom, Arts & entertainment, circus, Health services, Indian, merchants & industry, hobbies & collections, military, schools, old time barn, general store, archaeology, transporation. Reference room with history & genealogy books and magazines, Indian section, old school texts books.
History & Genealgoy books and magazines from England, east coast to midwest, Potawatomi Trail of Death archive. Round Barns history & photo archive, newspaper clippings, Fulton County authors, Ogle collection, Manitou Chapter DAR, Civil War & World War II collection, Rochester & Fulton newspapers,Tombaugh reference books & indexes.
Student tours of museum & living history village, cost $2 per student. Lectures and programs free to public every other month on Sunday.
Access: General Public
Appointment required: No
Four newsletters, each by a different branch of FCHS.
1=Fulton County Historical Society Newsletter, 3 times a year
2=Fulton County Folk Finder, twice a year
3=Fulton County Historical Power Assn. Newsletter, 4 times a year
4=Potawatomi Trail of Death Assn. Newsletter, twice a year
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