In this week’s update: Schoolhouse roof, Hyllningsfest photo project, Old Mill playing cards, and more!
In our weekly update, keep up to date on what staff and volunteers at the Lindsborg Old Mill & Swedish Heritage Museum are working on to lift up the history of Lindsborg and the surrounding region. This weekly update both looks back at what happened last week and looks ahead at what’s coming.
For April 8-14, 2024:
- We had about 25 people come out last week for our Solar Eclipse viewing party! Thanks to everyone who joined us on Heritage Square to enjoy this rare event!
- Raber Roofing finished re-roofing our historical one-room schoolhouse. The end result looks great and will help to prevent roof leaks and the building damage that could result.
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We will be applying for a grant to digitize and organize our collection of Svensk Hyllningsfest photos and memorabilia. Do you have photos, slides, movie films, etc. of Hyllningsfest that you would allow us to scan or be willing to donate to the museum? For the purposes of this particular grant we will be concentrating on the early years, 1941-1959 but all donations will be accepted.We will be sharing the scanned images on Flickr where many of the Hyllningsfest programs have already been uploaded.We will accept scans of photos but they do need to be high-quality scans (at least 800 dpi). Those can be sent to: oldmillmuseum@gmail.com.
- We had 30 registrants last Saturday for a German genealogy online workshop. Thanks to everyone who joined us for a great time of learning!
- The Kansas Anthropological Association meeting will be held this Saturday, April 20 here at the museum. We’re looking forward to welcoming everyone!
- More than 35 students from Trinity Catholic School in Hutchinson came for a museum tour on Friday morning.
- The Museum Handy Crew scraped and repainted the picnic tables on our front lawn on Wednesday. They’re planning to make repairs to the picnic tables in the Old Mill Campground this coming week.
- We added Old Mill playing cards to our gift shop!
- Coming soon: “Skeleton-Of-Dog… Selected Geology & Natural History Artifacts from the Bethany College Collection Archives” will be a temporary mini-exhibit at the museum opening April 2024 and featuring some unique artifacts not seen in public for decades!
- Staff continued working on grant applications.
- Millfest event planning continues this week. Watch for a full program coming out soon!
- We have extended our application period for a new museum Executive Director through April 30. Visit www.oldmillmuseum.org/careers for full details and application instructions.
- Registration is now open for the next Swedish Genealogy Workshop on June 8! Limited to 100 attendees, we have four great new sessions in this online learning opportunity!
- Millfest sponsorship opportunities are still available! If we happened to have missed you with our mailing, no problem – just use the sponsorship form HERE. Please send us your sponsorships by this Friday, April 19.
- Our Endowment Campaign 2025 is ongoing to add $1 million to our endowment in supporting our annual operational budget to make sure that not only do we preserve these historical treasures, but we can also “keep the lights on.” Read more on the flyer and giving form below, or visit to www.oldmillmuseum.org/donations to learn more!
Social Media Feature of the Week
Today we’d like to shout out the Facebook group Old and Interesting Places in Kansas! If you haven’t joined yet, you definitely should; and in particular check out the recent post by Leah Rose on April 10. Leah visited on April 8 for the Eclipse Viewing Party, then stayed around to check out the museum and mill. Her album on the Facebook group includes a lovely review and an album of more than SEVENTY great pictures from across the museum grounds.
Thank you to our museum volunteers last week!
Jerry Sperling, Cathy Ahlstedt, Carol Gusenius, Tim Stewart, Betty Amos, Leland Nelson, Mike Koch, and Karmon Almquist!