Museum

Museum of Western Expansion

The Museum is open during special events and tours are held at that time.  Special or individual tours are available and should be scheduled with the Curator or Head Docent.  School programs and speakers are available, please contact the Curator for programs and scheduling.

The Goal of the Museum of Western Expansion is “education;” our displays and aim is to represent the time period from 1760-1860.  To tell the story of the people who lived and worked in the area of the Peters Creek Watershed.  We will focus on the idea of “Life in a Box.”

We will focus on the few meager items that the early residents possessed.  Items carried in pockets, a box, or a sack.  Things that were carried from their original home or things that could be gathered quickly in times of war or items that were light enough to be carried for a long distance, as these people moved west with the frontier.  Hence the Idea of Western Expansion.

The area that encompasses the territory west of the Allegheny Mountains and is home to the Peters Creek Watershed was originally known as, “Backcountry.”  It was free land that was technically worthless and by treaty or purchase was available for settlement.

To learn more about our “specialty rooms” in the Wright House Museum, please select a link below.

The Native American Room
The Coal Mining Room
The Colonial Room
The Costume Room
The Kitchen
The Wright Room