Beaver Area Heritage Museum

Introduction

Text-to-speech Audio

Located in a renovated 90-year old Pittsburgh and Lake Eire Railroad freight station, the Beaver Area Heritage Museum opened in 1998 and “features important, regularly changing exhibits on the people, objects and events that have shaped our community’s history” (“Brief Background”). Exhibits include a timeline mural, artifacts exhibits, and biographical profiles of prominent Beaver residents or natives, in addition the center section that houses the changing exhibits. “Some rotating exhibits have included the actual dueling pistols used in the fatal duel between General Lachlan McIntosh, builder of Fort McIntosh in Beaver, and Button Gwinnett, signer of the Declaration of Independence, musicians of Beaver and the Beaver Valley, [and] the late Mayor Robert P. Linn” (“Exhibits”). The museum’s permanent collection houses over 5,000 artifacts that were made or used in the Beaver Area.

Images

Interior of the Beaver Area Heritage Museum (photo courtesy of the Beaver Area Heritage Museum/Nicholas Traub)

The former rail station that now houses the museum.

A re-created Civil War camp.

A local Beaver Area sports exhibit.

Backstory and Context

Text-to-speech Audio

Exhibits at the museum follow a rough chronological pattern and feature exhibits about the people, objects and events that shaped Beaver and the surrounding communities. It was also visited by soon-to-be President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney during their "whistle stop" tour in 2000. The building also houses a gift shop in the original freight office.

The Beaver Area Heritage Foundation was founded in 1996 to create a historical museum and was successfully able to do so thanks to the $450,000 the foundation raised through fundraising and generous donations. These funds enabled the foundation to purchase and renovate the freight station and restore some of the station’s original fixtures, including he main floor’s oak floors and the exterior lighting fixtures.

Sources

"Beaver Area Heritage Museum." Beaver Area Heritage Foundation. Accessed November 17, 2016. http://www.beaverheritage.org/museum.htm

Additional Information

http://www.beaverheritage.org/museum.htm