lbkulinski Griffith Depot and Historical Park, Griffith Historical Society, Town History Museum at the Franklin Center

Some Updates

A NEW PAGE

We have a new page on our website featuring the rebuild of our C&O Inspection Car that had been left in pieces when a renovation project was abandoned several years ago by the person who began it.

Thankfully, two men who have a passion for these vintage work cars stepped up and are bringing our little car back to life. Look for information and photos here.

FRANKLIN CENTER MUSEUM CLOSED UNTIL SEPTEMBER
               
The Model Railroad group at Franklin Center has closed down for the summer. When they are not open, we do not have easy access to bathroom facilities, so we must close also. We will be open the 3rd Saturday in September, the 17th, from 10 a.m to 2 p.m.

As we did this past summer and through last winter, we will be again working on new displays during our downtime. In particular, we will be setting up displays in our new school and school sports room.

papakulinski Town History Museum at the Franklin Center

Updates!

Good news! Our Franklin Center Display Room is open again.

This month due to the holiday, we were open on the 2nd Saturday, and will be open on the 4th Saturday, September 25th. In October we will go back to our normal first and third Saturdays, October 2nd and 16th. Enter through Door G off the big parking lot.

While we were closed for the summer, we began redoing the first six display cases in our History room to tell the whole Story of Griffith, from its earliest beginnings through its incorporation in 1904. This will be an ongoing project through the fall.

Watch this space for more information about upcoming events and activities, including running The Hess Express at Griffith Octoberfest, our Annual Dinner and Meeting, and Santa in the Caboose. All of these will be dependent upon Indiana’s COVID protocols.

lbkulinski Activities & Events, Griffith Historical Society, Museums

Griffith Historical Society hosted its first Calumet Outdoors Tour

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On November 16th, we hosted a Calumet Outdoor Series Tour, which came from a contact at the Field Museum.

Mario Longoni, Urban Anthropology Manager at The Field Museum, is the Calumet Outdoor Coordinator and is working to unite the Northwest Indiana historical societies to help preserve, promote and expand their combined resources and assets for the mutual benefit of the residents and enthusiasts of regional history.

The plan is for these different area historical societies to meet every three months to learn more about each other,  sharing each other’s history and local stories and how they operate within their communities. In addition, the Outdoor Series will be creating a traveling relic tour to offer additional opportunities to provide further education on the history and what makes each of the areas unique.

Considering this was our first time ever hosting something like this, it was a great turn-out. The twenty-four people who attended could not say enough great things about how beautiful Griffith is, and how supported we were with help from the community for our event. The Griffith Fire Department came out and grilled hot dogs, with proceeds going to the Historical Society, and the Griffith Girl Scout troop 15476 provided complimentary hot chocolate for visitors.

Even our signature Santa in a Caboose made an early stop to be available for the kids and a member of our Town Council played a major role in this event.

These visitors from the Calumet and Chicagoland  areas toured our Griffith Historical Park with its Depot Museum, Railroad Cars and Watch Tower. Inside the depot and railroad cars they were treated to a verbal and visual historical display of our town’s origins and railroading heritage presented by Karen Kulinski, our museum curator. 

The group was also able to visit our Franklin Center Museum with its artifacts and displays of our town’s history, and stop for lunch or refreshments in town before going back home.

Developed from an interview with Toni Rickert, Vice President, and Karen Kulinski, Secretary and Museum Curator, of the Griffith Historical Society.