Pottawatomie County Museum — Attraction in Shawnee

As a hack genealogist, I've visited history museums and genealogy libraries all over the US. This one is cream of the crop both in quality of displays and staff knowledge and helpfulness. The artifacts are beautifully organized, presented and cared for. The building is spotless, and it doesn't have the musty old smell that's common in this type of facility ... It is obvious that the staff and entire community take great pride in its history adequately support it. Ken Landry was fantastic. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of the area and his materials are all scanned and organized into folders by family. He wasn't immediately familiar with the family we are researching, but as soon as we found a hint in one of the early directories, he was off and provided a lot of previously unknown information and was able to quickly find a photo of the hotel they ran. He's an amazing resource, and every other person in the museum was just wonderful, warm and welcoming. (The Pottawatomie County Facebook page is great too, and frequently updated.) This is the model that other counties should look to in honoring their history and helping visitors...

Theres way way more stuff in here than you would believe! The room inside the first floor of the tower has a model of town with multiple model trains that takes up almost the entire room. Its motion activated so it starts when you get near it. That was the biggest model train ive ever seen. Theres another room in back with a very impressive model town and train but its only half of the other one. They also had various antiquities there from throughout the days of...

Absolutely one of the best looking train depots in Oklahoma. Beautiful. Looks much like a castle from the outside. The inside is a museum and has a very low admission charge like a couple of dollars each. The museum is nice but lacks train items. It has war memorabilia some Indian items. But it is a train museum. The building is unusual inside and very nice to look at. It is my understanding they have plans to change...