Almost every weekend during my childhood, my parents would pack me, my younger sister, and a pair of dachshunds into the back seat of the family car. After a thirty-minute drive we arrived in Randolph to visit both my dad’s parents and my mom’s parents. Sometimes we spent the entire weekend at one of their homes so that my parents could help with activities like building structures, harvesting apples, baling hay, harvesting cranberries, and canning fruits and vegetables.
As a child, I didn’t have many responsibilities beyond helping with the housework and staying out of the way of whatever activity was taking place. So until I was in my mid-teens, my sister and I spent a lot of time together outdoors in the countryside exploring and observing the natural world. We were carefree and happy and knew little about the world outside of that in which we lived, learned, and played.
Growing up in Coos County, I learned a bit about the history of the area, mostly in terms of the logging and fishing industries. A train engine sat outside the local Coos-Curry Museum which displayed many old artifacts inside. A couple of times I went to the museum with classmates for school field trips. I don’t recall much about the local history exhibits but of couple of items in the museum I remember to this day: a picture postcard of Tom Thumb and his wife, and a couple framed pieces of woven hair art made from the hair of someone’s deceased family member. Sadly, I remember the exotica exhibited in the museum but little of the local history.
Fortunately, as an adult I have a better-developed frame of reference for learning about the past. I look forward to visiting Coos County museums in the future, particularly the Bandon Historical Society Museum.