Column: Preserving the Past, by Pat Mulso

The leaves are turning color and fall is in the air. As we enter the last quarter of the year nothing is slowing down at your county museum. We have lots of things scheduled and in progress as a very busy year wraps up. We want to thank everyone that attended our grand opening of the museum addition the last Sunday in September. It was a great afternoon!

Tickets are available now for our first Christmas Tour of Homes. It will be from 1 to 4 p.m. Nov. 16. Tickets are $15 and are available now at the following locations: Albert Lea Convention & Visitors Bureau, the Mary-Go-Round Shoppe, Addie’s Floral & Gifts, the Albert Lea-Freeborn County Chamber of Commerce and the Freeborn County Historical Museum.

The tour includes stops at five different locations to get you in the mood early for decorating for the Christmas holiday and maybe give you some new holiday ideas. You may tour the locations in any order you like, but you will need your ticket to enter each location and your ticket will be stamped as you enter each place. The locations are as follows: the Freeborn County Historical Museum, 1031 Bridge Ave., Albert Lea, Czech Inn, 19158 800th Ave., Hayward, Brad and Jody Kirchner residence, 417 Vine Ave., Albert Lea, Brad and Nancy Wright’s condo, 1260 Wright Drive, Albert Lea, and the Pat and Arnie Mulso residence, 510 W. Richway Drive, Albert Lea.

The Christmas Tour of Homes is a fundraiser for the museum addition building fund. To date we have raised about $1.4 million but need to raise approximately an additional $266,000. We would like to thank everyone that has donated and supported our efforts to continue to protect and preserve the history and heritage of Freeborn County.

The museum is hosting two four-hour refresher defensive driving classes yet this year. The first class is tomorrow from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and the last one is from 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. Nov. 4. The cost is $19 and you must pre-register for the class.

The museum has a new website. Our new website is www.fchm.us. Check us out. You can now pay your memberships online if you like as well as the ability to reserve the meeting room, buy yearbooks or other items we have for sale, make a donation to the building fund or just check to see what events are coming up. We are in the process of adding the “Legends” that are historical articles that have appeared on our website in the past. You can also check out our volunteer needs or schedule a tour. A special thank you to Marble Island Consulting for building our new site as a donation to the museum.

Please note that the Freeborn County Genealogical Society Meeting will be at 7 p.m. Oct. 21 rather than Oct. 14 due to the genealogical research trip to Salt Lake City. So join us on Oct. 21 to hear about our research trip and what’s new at the world’s largest genealogical library.

Just a reminder, the museum and library are open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. Remember it is never too late to start working on your family history and there is no better time than now to begin! Future generations are depending on you!

 

Pat Mulso is the executive director of the Freeborn County Historical Museum in Albert Lea.