The Community Post

Minster’s past on display now

Minster Historical Society and Museum open to view never-seen-before displays

By COREY MAXWELL Managing Editor

MINSTER — The heritage in Minster is rich and community members can experience it firsthand at the Minster Historical Society and Museum which is open, showcasing all new exhibits.

The museum held an open house on Sunday for the community to view exhibits that are on display for the first time ever.

The museum, located at 112 W. 4th St., outgrew its space and was looking to expand so when Mel’s Decorating came up for sale, historical society officials knew they had to buy it.

“We were fortunate three years ago that this building became available,” said Mary Oldiges, museum curator.

“We had this part of the building, which is owned by the town, we bought the building next door when it went up for sale which was Mel’s Decorating — which that building in itself has such a huge history,” said Lisa Watercutter, president of the Minster Historical Society board. “It’s been saloons, it’s been a market, it’s been a lot of things. We took it down to studs and totally redid it all. The building itself is over 150 years old so it needed a lot of work.”

Oldiges said the building did not have any insulation and it needed to be brought up to code with electrical, plumbing and other areas.

“We started out three years ago, bought the building and then we had to meet all the state standards. So

we tore this building, which looked good,” she said. “It was built in the 1860s. We torn it down to the bare studs and started over because it needed all new wiring and plumbing. There wasn’t a lick of insulation and we now have to meet state standards. It got real sorrowful before it got any better.”

Oldiges said she began planning things out and took the project to Garmann Miller and Associates who helped with drawing up the blueprints.

An original quote to get everything up to state standards was $300,000, a steep price for the historical society, so they turned to volunteers.

“We had such a huge, fabulous amount of volunteers from the very beginning. From demolition to yesterday,” said Oldiges. “They have saved us beaucoup dollars. It’s just invaluable that people have volunteered. It took us a lot longer to do it that way but we didn’t have $300,000 to hire a builder to do the work. Good things come for those who wait. We’re tickled to death it’s looking this wonderful. We’re ready to give it back to the public. We charge nothing for people to come and visit. There’s no fee. We just do it for the love of Minster and to preserve our history. And to give everybody a little insight into our past.”

The new section of the museum allows for more rooms to display items such as: bedroom, kitchen and dining room displays from the early 1900s; a hero’s room highlighting war veterans, police and first responders; a shelf showcasing technology throughout the years and plenty more.

One part of the museum in the original building displays original road street names that were changed in 1920. It is believed that the antiGerman sediment after World War I was the driving force behind the request and the new names reflected U.S. president and historical U.S. figures. Vienna Street became Hamilton Street, Berlin Street became Webster Street and Zweibrucken Street became Lincoln Street, among others.

“That’s the really neat part, to pass that knowledge on to people,” said Minster Historical Society Board President Lisa Watercutter. “I’ve been on the board for probably about five years and I learn something new every time we do a display and every time we do something. You just never know.”

Watercutter said someone made a comment to her on Sunday when seeing postcards of different businesses that have closed over the years.

“Yes the businesses have closed, but they’ve all impacted our history,” she said. “They’ve all impacted today. It’s just neat.”

Watercutter said the school room is one of her favorite displays in the building.

The school room features all things Minster Wildcats from band uniforms to trophies to desks among many other items and memorabilia.

“I just think it’s a really cool. I’m a Wildcat at heart I guess,” she said. “I just really like how all of that came together.”

In the new part of the building, there’s a display honoring Minster native Katie Horstman who grew up playing CYO softball. During a game at St. Henry, a scout told the St. Henry coach that he though Horstman was good enough to play professional baseball. She ended up signing to play for the Fort Wayne Daisies making $250 per month. She pitched and played third baseman for the club in the All American Girls Professional Baseball League.

Horstman played baseball up until 1957 and she was the one responsible for starting the track and field team at Minster, which had success early on and has had success ever since.

The museum installed its Hall of Honor, which bridges the two buildings, and has bricks in the floor of people’s names who contributed to the project.

“It’s so neat the way this has all come together now,” said Oldiges. “Even when you’re going through the Hall of Honor with the tree and the donors and you can look both ways into the Heritage Park area which has some artifacts in it too.”

The expansion gave the society freedom, and room, to organize new displays and showcase things for the first time ever.

“We have storage upstairs which we never had storage on site. So we added that and added extra room,” said Watercutter. “We originally had a hero’s room which doubled in size. We were able to put so much more out. It’s amazing when you go back though some of these things and you say, ‘We don’t have anything on that business or church history as we don’t have artifacts from the church because they’re given to other places or they’re sent back to the archdiocese — those kinds of things. So when you do get a piece it’s kind of fun to have it.”

As for the location, Oldiges thinks it’s in a great spot to showcase the village’s history.

“I think it’s the perfect location. We’re near the very infamous Miami Erie Canal. That’s a very historic site,” she said. “It’s been really special that we can finally get out all of these artifacts that we didn’t have room for before.”

The Minster Historical Society and Museum is open on from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. on Sundays and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Tuesdays. There is no charge for admission.

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