In this week’s update: Swedish Pavilion fully reopened, remembering Maleta Forsberg, and more!
In this 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 and looks ahead at what’s coming.
For August 11-17, 2025:
- The 1904 World’s Fair Swedish Pavilion is FULLY open again to museum visitors! With cleaning now completed through all interior areas of the historic structure, our guests are now able to fully enjoy everything this rare treasure has to offer following major stability repairs to prevent the accidental collapse of the Pavilion.
Last week, Adam updated our informational guest map to reflect the reopening.
Plans are in the works for a reopening celebration.
- We celebrate the life of Maleta Ann Forsberg today and mark her passing last week on Tuesday, August 12. Maleta was a renownedLindsborg artist, and did her part to preserve Swedish culture and history as a member of the museum board of directors in the 1970s and 1980s. She will be greatly missed.
- With stability repairs on the 1904 World’s Fair Swedish Pavilion now complete, we are now in the “Raise the Roof” portion of the Pavilion repairs fundraising campaign.
Tax credits are still available for the 2025 tax year for donations under this campaign. Proceeds go to help with a new planned Pavilion roof that will be more durable and with a more historically accurate look! There will also be opportunities to have a “roof tile” with custom wording added to a permanent honor wall to recognize contributions to replace the roof; details will be coming soon.
The total contributed to the new roof is now more than $35,000. There is still capacity for more than $52,000 in donations possible under the grant, with eligible donations qualifying for a 70% fully refundable tax credit on Kansas taxes.
Last week, Adam continued work on a physical mailing for the campaign. It just needs a few offices supplies to finish preparing the materials and it can be sent out. He also processed a new $300 donation last week under the credit program.
Learn more at www.oldmillmuseum.org/raise-the-roof.
- The upcoming workshops from Pursuing YOUR Past – “DNA: There’s No EASY Button…Yet!” – a month away on September 13 – and the next daylong Online Swedish Genealogy Workshop on November 8 are now open and available for registrations!
- Prepurchase is also currently available for the second annual “Magic at the Mill” card tournament held at the museum on Saturday, September 20, in collaboration with local gaming store Spelbok. It will be a prerelease “Spider-Man” set themed tournament for $54.99 or Open Casual Commander for $10. Both registrations come with a guided tour of the 1898 Smoky Valley Roller Mills!
- Adam processed a renewing museum membership. Get your membership or renew today at www.oldmillmuseum.org/members!
- Adam also processed an online gift shop order.
- Museum staff met with our grants writing contractor on priority planning.
- Adam worked on the final report for the 2024-2025 Arts Commission General Operating Support grant.
- Staff is working on evaluating its property insurance and has reached out to other Kansas museums to learn from their processes.
- Lenora and Adam reviewed maintenance needs for the volunteer Handy Crew to help with.
- The Handy Crew put in critical time on grounds work – pulling weeds, trimming, taking out small trees out of place, hauling off a small felled limb, fixing loose boards on the Train Depot and picking up trash in the Old Mill Campground.
- On Thursday, Bill Ferguson sprayed weeds in the Old Mill parking lot and driveways.
- Tyler continued working on the Historic Image Database on Tuesday and Thursday. The project now includes more than 9,300 images and has received more than 460,000 views!
In a slightly different focus last week for the project, Tyler has been prepping Chester Bruce history papers to be ready for upload to be accessible to the public in pdf format. - Lenora has continued working on an indexing project under contract with ArkivDigital.
- Need a great gift for the genealogist or history enthusiast in your life? NEW in the museum gift shop, you can now purchase a gift certificate good for a free registration to one of the museum’s Online Swedish Genealogy Workshops anytime in 2025 ($50) or a 2025 Pursuing YOUR Past presentation ($10). Your gift recipient will receive a one-time-use code by email or mail good to pay for the registration fee for one of these popular sessions!
Thank you to our weekly volunteers!
Recent volunteers include Tim Stewart, Betty Amos, Cathy Ahlstedt, Jerry Sperling, Karmon Almquist, Leland Nelson, Jerry Hammerton, and Michael Peterson.