Mt. Kearsage Indian Museum: Experience the Native History of Concord
The story of Mt. Kearsage Indian Museum begins in 1929, when founder Charles “Bud” Thompson’s second-grade classroom was visited by Grand Chief Sachem Silverstar (Atwood I. Williams), leader of both the Paucatuck Eastern Pequot and the Mashantucket Western Pequot tribes. Young Thompson was fascinated by the chief’s speech on the interconnectedness of life and the existence of beneficial talents within everyone. Later that year, on summer vacation in Connecticut, the youngster dug up an arrowhead on his grandfather’s farm. Thus, a fascination with Native American artifacts was born and the seed for the Mt. Kearsage Indian Museum was planted.
Thompson and his wife, Nancy, found themselves deeply disturbed by the lack of respect for the natural world they witnessed around them, and so decided to create the museum in 1990 as a way to showcase how the Native American tribes worked with the land rather than trying to bend it to their wills. But their museum would be unique: not a mere collection of artifacts, but rather a living education and cultural center. This “museum with a voice," as the founders termed it, would have as its aim the communication of Silverstar’s message delivered so long ago.
The museum’s seven galleries cover 20,000 years of tribal history in New Hampshire, with artifacts including moccasins, arrowheads, and other archaeological items uncovered in Native American dig sites. Particular to Mt. Kearsage Indian Museum is the Medicine Woods Natural Trail, a series of outdoor sites sculpted with plants the native tribes of North America found useful for medicines, dyes, and other daily needs.
The Medicine Woods is unique in that when the Thompsons first began planning Mt. Kearsage, that particular wooded area was an unofficial dump filled with coils of barbed wire, a refrigerator, bald tires, smashed glass, and lengths of rope among other dangerous items. It took a substantial amount of time to clean up the area before the Medicine Woods could be opened to the public, but today, this wooded trail is a pristine refuge from the frantic pace of the contemporary world.
Self-guided tours are always available when the museum is open, with the last admission to the galleries at 4 p.m. each day. There are also docent-guided tours every day at 2 p.m., except for festival days, and museum educators take people out through the Medicine Woods each day as well. Guided tours of the museum and grounds are available for groups of 10 or more with advance reservations.
Posted on May 11, 2011 by Matt Delman
