HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WINDHAM COUNTY INC

The new COUNTY JAIL MUSEUM: This newest program service is located just steps from HSWC's West River Railroad Museum and County Museum at the heart of Newfane Village. It is planned to be open in spring 2025 and admission will be free of charge. The new Museum will interpret the history of the Windham County Jail and offer additional exhibitions telling the stories of the people of Windham County. It will offer long-awaited additional space to showcase more of HSWC's collections and to interpret the history of the people and towns of Windham County.

The County Museum of the HSWC: It is located on Rte 30 (Main Street) in Newfane, VT. It is staffed part-time by a salaried Curator and an Associate Curator and is open to the public free of charge three afternoons a week (from 12 to 5 on Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays) from late May through mid-October. The County Museum serves as a repository for the HSWC's significant collections of historic objects and archives relating to Windham County, Vermont. The public is invited to use museum resources for personal research on regularly open days or by appointment. The Museum offers genealogy research services. The Museum includes a mini-museum store where mission-related items such as postcards, notecards, pictures, and publications focused on Windham County history are made available for purchase. Profits from these sales, as well as from donations left by visitors, support the museum's operations. The County Museum is a primary educational resource for students, educators, researchers and the general public. The Society's archives include materials dating from the 17th-21st centuries. Books, journals, photographs, maps scrapbooks, documents and other primary resources are available to the public for personal and professional research, with research assistance provided. The County Museum houses an invaluable collection of close to 10,000 artifacts and archival materials relating to Windham County. The Museum's two floors of exhibition space display impressive examples of early Vermont furniture, folk art, early portraits, agricultural tools, military equipment and Civil War artifacts. Clothing and textiles, children's toys, paintings and photographs all tell stories of Windham County's history. Local favorites are the Newfane General Store exhibit, the Porter Thayer Photography exhibit and the story of the infamous highwayman "Thunderbolt." They also preserve an extensive collection of artifacts and documents relating to the history of the West River Railroad. In the future it will become the HSWC Research and Genealogy Center.