The House of History becomes a Blue Star Museum

The FCHMS has joined with the National Endowment for the Arts and Blue Star Families to become a Blue Star Museum. Being a Blue Star Museum means that from Memorial Day, May 28, 2012 and extending through Labor Day, September 3, 2012 the museum will provide free admission to active duty military personnel and their families on days when the museum is scheduled to be open. We look forward to welcoming our guests and thanking them for their service to our country.

Fourth Grade School Program

Busy minds and hands at the first day of the fall 2010 Fourth Grade Museum Day school program at the House of History museum in Malone:

House of History Molasses Cookies

Here's the recipe for those famous molasses cookies, made and eaten by thousands of 4th graders over the past 35 years as they visited the House of History museum:


4 c. flour
1 c. sugar
1 t. salt
1 t. baking soda
1 t. ginger
2 t. cinnamon
1 c. shortening
1 c. molasses
2 eggs

Sift together the first six ingredients. Cut in shortening. Add molasses and eggs. Mix well, using hands. Roll teaspoonful of dough into a ball and roll in extra sugar in dish or on wax paper. Place on greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees (F) for 8-10 minutes (12-15 for crunchy cookies).

- The recipe is halved when used at the museum
- This recipe also appears in "The Malone Cookbook", 1983 edition. (available in museum gift shop)

Do you remember visiting the House of History as a 4th grader? Can you still smell those cookies baking? Make a batch today and plan to visit the Franklin County Historical & Museum Society again - or for the first time.

The House of History summer hours are Tuesday & Thursday 1-4pm for tours. The Schryer Center for Historical & Genealogical Research summer hours are Tuesday through Friday, 1-4pm (plus four Saturdays in July: 10, 17, 24, 31).

A Blog 106 Years in the Making

The Franklin County Historical & Museum Society was founded in 1903 by a group of citizens intent upon preserving the material history of Franklin County, NY and fostering an appreciation of their shared past. The original articles of incorporation, dated January 7, 1903, give the objects of the Society as:

FIRST, To promote and encourage original historical research.

SECOND, To disseminate a greater knowledge of the history of Franklin County by the publication of literature relating to it.

THIRD, To gather books, manuscripts, pictures and relics of historic interest, and to establish a repository at Malone for their preservation.

Franklin Gazette clippings from the first secretary's notebook (click to enlarge)

The Society was re-incorporated in 1966 and granted an absolute charter by the New York State Board of Regents on November 24, 1969.

This foray into the world of blogging may not have been even in the wildest imaginations of those first members of the Historical Society, but their goal of "disseminat[ing] a greater knowledge of the history of Franklin County" is our great ambition here at this new blog, and we hope to make good on their promise.