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.

lbkulinski Activities & Events, Barrel Train, Griffith Historical Society, Town History Museum at the Franklin Center

New Historical Society Events!

Open House at our Franklin Center Museum, followed by our first Historical Walking Tour.

September 11th – 6 pm

Join us as we tour Broad Street’s 100 N and 100 S blocks to learn about some old-time businesses, the railroads and early Griffith citizens. This is a first for us, but a couple more tours are planned in coming weeks.

The Hess Express is running at the Fall Harvest Craft Festival in Central Park.

September 28-29 – 10 to 5 pm, weather permitting.

The Hess Express is running at Griffith’s Octoberfest in Central Park.

October 4, 5 & 6 – weather permitting. Friday – 4 pm to dusk; Saturday and Sunday – 1 pm to dusk.

A new Fun Fall event coming in late October. More details coming soon.

December – Santa dates To Be Announced in November.

lbkulinski Depot & Train Museums, Griffith Historical Society, Town History Museum at the Franklin Center

What’s Up for 2019?

IMG_2486We’ve got a lot going on this year!

— We have a new operating status, Board Member Emeritus, which is designated for long-time board members who, because of health or age issues, can no longer serve as an officer or director, but still want to be involved in our activities. These members have been devoted to the Society and have years of experience we can draw upon.  Current Emeriti are listed at the foot of the page, along with current officers and board members.

— At Franklin Center, we are in the process of creating a new display board — this one will be permanent – entitled, GRIFFITH BECOMES AN OFFICIAL TOWN.  Items displayed will be from 1904 and 1905, and include the petition for incorporation, election notice, election judges’ affidavits, 1904 special census, balloting results and incorporation order. These documents were saved by our late Board Member Merle Colby when they were going to be thrown out.  And new school displays will be created this summer, as well.

— We continue to enter information into our cataloging program created for us four years ago by student member Logan Kulinski.  To date we have entered nearly 10,000 items into this program, which are available for viewing and printing out when needed.

— At the Historical Park, basement cleaning is being done now and when the weather is better, a Boy Scout will be painting the inside of the Depot for his Eagle Scout Project.

— We are also considering two new events for the  summer and fall. Watch this space as more information will be added as we’re further along in each project. As always, we are looking for volunteers so email [email protected] if you are interested in helping.