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The
Douglas County Historical Society and
Museum
by Ed Crabtree
I
feel blessed to have had the opportunity to tour
some of the wonderful museums and interpretative
centers scattered throughout the Ozarks as well as
across this great state. From the small privately
owned enterprises to the great public halls that
have become repositories of antiquity, from those
large institutions funded by grants from
philanthropists with deep pockets to small town
organizations that depend on sales of booklets and
donations for survival, the latter of these being
foremost among my favorites.
Large
museums with expensive glass cases in which to
house rare documents and artifacts of historical
importance, to me, pale by comparison to those
small town archives, that house the everyday
appurtenances that your parents or grandparents, as
well as mine used day in and day out, and took for
granted just as we take for granted the appliances
and tools that are commonly found in our homes and
workplaces today. You see, the common everyday
items, things that might not seem of great import
to the large museums that concentrate on priceless
and rare artifacts, are objects that when
understood, give us a better understanding of the
lives of those that came before us. "It gives us a
grounding effect." To quote Pete Engler from an
interview elsewhere in this issue of THE MESSAGE
TREE, a grounding effect being a greater
understanding of those people whose shoulders we
now stand upon, a greater appreciation of how they
dealt with daily adversity, without the modern
conveniences we now have. They give us a window,
through which to view the past, a view with minute
detail and all the ambiance of a Norman Rockwell
painting, a view that tells a story, a view that
makes us appreciate what we are blessed with.
The
work of preserving the past for this and future
generations, is indeed a labor of love. Only a few
of us, these days, can find it in our hearts to
donate of ourselves to those organizations and
institutions that are committed to archiving
artifacts that were the everyday utilitarian tools
and devices used by our ancestors. One such
organization here in the Ozarks whose volunteers
spend an extraordinary amount of time dedicating
them selves to this service to our society, is the
Douglas County Historical Society and museum, in
Ava Missouri.
Highway
14, like so many other such routes through this
great land, passes through the historic town square
and in the second block just east of the heart of
Ava stands a wonderful piece of Ozarks
architecture.
Although the original structure
is over one hundred years old, this grand dame of a
bygone era, has been remodeled and added onto
numerous times over the past century, at onetime
left abandoned to fall into disrepair, and now has
been taken over by a terrific group of volunteers
and through their tender loving care this
centaurian is slowly being rejuvenated to its
former glory.
The
H.S. Wilson house, that today is the home of the
Douglas County Historical and Genealogical Society
and Douglas County Museum, is much more than just
an old building that has been taken over and
restored by a group of volunteers. The rooms of
this old house are so much more than the halls of
marble found in larger museums, from the warmth of
the wood flooring to the uniqueness of the trim and
casings throughout the building, the Wilson house
itself tells a story of life long ago in the
Ozarks. These cozy and friendly rooms are so much
more fitting in which to archive the personal
possessions of those citizens that built the
foundation upon which Douglas County now stands,
than their cold impersonal big city
counterparts.
First
formed in 1973 and regrouped in 1978, the society
has labored to bring together a collection of
displays in each room, a vignette of everyday life
as it was in the past. For example the schoolhouse
room contains material and pieces, artifacts that
have been donated, which are what you really would
have found in a Douglas County one-room schoolhouse
a lifetime ago.
The medical room is furnished,
as you would have found a Doctor's office back in
the days when they practiced medicine out of their
own homes. The Kitchen has everything in it that
your Grandma might have had in her kitchen when
your mother was a child, and so forth. But what
sets smaller institutions such as this apart is
that no artifact is deemed too insignificant for
inclusion in a display, a concept that big city
institutions sometimes fail to grasp, each item
providing a nuance that makes each display a more
concise portal in time whereby you can view an
enhanced portrait of the past.
Our thanks to Mr. Guy H. Gettys,
President of the Historical and
Genealogical Society
who was our gracious host during our tour
of the museum.
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But
not only does the building house antique artifacts
of early Douglas County, it also is an archive of
genealogical records compiled by numerous
volunteers. Countless documents, volumes of
research about pioneer families, virtually a small
library of local records are housed here and is
sure to prove to be a wealth of data to those who
study in search of their roots and lineage. It is
amazing just how much material has been compiled
and deposited in the care of the historical and
genealogical society. But most of all, when you
visit a institution such as this, your tour guide
is not someone who had to attend college to learn
about the artifacts and their use, but someone who
actually lived there and remembers using the
objects in the displays, or at least heard about
such from someone who did. More than once have I
heard an Ozarker make the following observation,
"Book learning ain't half as good as havin' lived
it."
Everyone
living in Douglas County has good reason to be
proud of the museum in Ava, and the citizens of
Douglas County as well as all the rest of us that
love the Ozarks, should thank these volunteers for
their hard work and dedication. So on your next
outing in Ozark Mountain Country, take time to
venture down a road less traveled, drive over to
see the Douglas County Museum, and be sure to tell
them nice folks that Ed and the staff of THE
MESSAGE TREE said howdy.
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Stone
Creek Crossing
