MT. VERNON, Ohio – Every county has something that tells its story, but in Ohio it’s tough to top the Knox County Agriculture Museum located in Mt. Vernon.

Open since 1984 and located on the premise of the county’s fairgrounds, the museum has undergone several expansion projects and now houses more than 5,000 items in 20,000 square feet of space. It details farm and rural live in Knox County during the past 160 years.

“There are all kinds of things that belong in this museum,” said Greg Magers, the museum’s coordinator and a sixth-generation farmer who lives in Knox County. “Many of us who are officers and committee members for this museum have children who are millennial. This museum is to let them, and others know that agriculture is and has been the backbone of this and other counties across this state. Our artifacts are here to show how things looked on the farm the past 200 years or so. And not surprising, we add to it each year.”

From antique tractors and attachments, a threshing machine, sewing machines and various kinds of antique home appliances, every wall and corner of the museum speaks of an earlier period.

At the very front of the museum sits a 1923 Centerburg Model T school bus made of wood and on spoke wheels. Knox County, like the other 87 counties in Ohio, is changing, and so is the technology they use. But the walls of this museum house something its organizers hope will never be lost – the history of their county with its unique identity.

The building is organized into wings, based on when they were constructed. The main wing is the largest at nearly 200 feet long and houses most of the farm exhibits. One room is dedicated to antique household furnishings and farm tools. Another room is dedicated to old sewing machines.

On site is a Conestoga wagon, which was popular in Ohio and Pennsylvania during the late 18th into the 19th century. Other displays include a horse-drawn hearse with coffins inside, butchering tools, a corn cutting sulky, a five-faucet shower, early laundry washing machines and early corn planters.

Outside the museum sits the Tiger Valley School House, a restored one-room schoolhouse that was in eastern Knox County. It was dismantled and erected near the museum in 1993.

Then there’s the 1881 log house, which was moved to the display from the village of Gambier, just five miles to the east of the fairgrounds. Its lower level is displayed with a stove and sleeping quarters. Visitors will see old butchering tools, hay making equipment, corn shellers, a stone gristmill, cream separators and butter churns. The museum houses the Loom Room, made up of eight workable looms and operated weekly by eight members.

From the cabin, visitors can step outside to the spring house, build in 1850, and the smokehouse, built in the early 1900s.

Art Mizer is the assistant coordinator, Helen McKee is the museum secretary, David Greer is the corresponding secretary and Jim Barber is the treasurer. Ten others comprise the executive committee while 30 more are museum members. “We’re always on the lookout to receive donations of farm equipment, small tools, homemaking goods, documents and more that reflect how life was on the farms and in Knox County over the past 200 years,” Magers said.

The Knox County Agricultural Museum is open all days of the Knox County Fair and during special events held at the fairgrounds.

 For more information about the museum contact Magers at 740-398-6617.