Civil War-era buckle among the items headed for Discovery Museum's collection
A belt buckle from a Civil War-era uniform, historical documents from Fort Sheridan and other items with ties to Lake County's past soon will join the Lake County Discovery Museum's already diverse collection.
Most of the items are from the 20th century, but a few are older - including that Union Army buckle. It was unearthed on the same Warren Township property as some Union Army uniform buttons and more than a dozen Native American stone points that are even older and also are being donated to the museum, officials said.
"It's an exciting group of donations," said Diana Dretske, the collections coordinator for the Lake County Forest Preserve District, which runs the museum. "We're so grateful to people for thinking of us as the repository where these items should be preserved and interpreted as part of the county's history."
Other items to be donated:
• A U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps cape worn at the former St. Therese Hospital in Waukegan in 1945.
• A football signed by the 1965 roster of the Lake County Rifles, a semipro football team in the 1960s and early 1970s.
• A souvenir toy from the former Hawthorn Mellody dairy farm near Libertyville that was manufactured around 1950.
• Military police bulletins, souvenir pillow cases and property records from Fort Sheridan.
Dretske found the documents about Fort Sheridan, which was an Army base from 1887 to 1993 but now is a forest preserve and a residential development, particularly interesting.
"(They) are dense with information and add to what we know about life at the fort," Dretske said.
Many of the donations are in private collections. Some are coming from historical societies or other groups.
Once acquired, the items will be stored at the museum site near Wauconda. They will move with the rest of the collection to the museum's new home in Libertyville.
Some of the items will be considered for future display at the museum, Dretske said. Others, such as the Fort Sheridan property records, will be made available to researchers.
The forest board's education committee discussed the proposed donations this week. The full board is expected to approve the plan when it meets Tuesday.