The story of the region that would one day become Carroll County began millions of years ago, but it’s only in the past few centuries that museums have told the tales of towns and village and counties and communities, and the settlers who formed them as they struck out to tame the land and build a nation.

These communities have histories that go back to the days when Chief Black Hawk’s Sauk Indian tribe ruled the land, when natives enjoyed a prairie untouched by the march of progress and where animals had roamed the land for millennia. That was up until the 1820s and 1830s, when the first White settlers moved in and displaced the natives, building towns along rivers that, along with stagecoaches and rail lines, helped towns prosper and grow. Communities rich in industry and rooted in agriculture developed hard-working lifestyles in their people, and a desire to tell their stories.

As more people spilled across the land and made their own history, preserving those stories became increasingly important. Research that took place 100 to 150 years ago documented what life was like for both man and beast up until modern times, providing a foundation on which today’s gatekeepers of history can stand as they continue to refine stories of the 19th and 20th centuries and preserve stories of the present at local museums.

Carroll County’s history isn’t contained in a single story or landmark, but spread across homes, depots, schoolhouses and museums that preserve everyday life as it once was. They are places that offer windows into how towns formed, worked and endured.

You can find those storytellers throughout Carroll County and its museums, where volunteers and helpful historians and dedicated docents are committed to celebrating the past. Maintaining these places for future generations to learn from and enjoy also takes financial support, and ways to donate are made available at each location – from money to labor.

So, load up the family in the car and enjoy a trip down memory lane ...

Owen P. Miles Museum, Carroll County Historical Society

Address: 107 W. Broadway

Phone: 815-244-3474

Hours: 1 to 5 p.m. Thursday and Saturday from May to December, or by appointment

Online: historyincarrollcounty.org, Carroll County Historical Society on Facebook

Housed in an 1873 Italianate home, the Carroll County Historical Society’s collection of artifacts and stories displays much of the county’s history. A pair of rooms are dedicated to the Miles Family, who built and owned the home. Miles owned the town mill in the 1850s and later served in local public offices and was an executive of the town’s First National Bank.

The museum’s collection continues to grow through donations approved by the Carroll County Historical Society board, whether for permanent display or temporary exhibits, board president Sue Appel said. Each item is carefully documented.

“We try to get as much information as we can on each item that is supplied to us,” Appel said. “That’s what makes them interesting because you can look at it and think, ‘This came from there,’ and ‘There’s a story behind this.’”

In the Miles family rooms, visitors can find old photos, period furniture and the Miles Family Bible dating to 1857. Other highlights on the first floor include a desk once used by Helen Scott Hay in Savanna (“Carroll County’s most famous daughter,” a prominent figure in the nursing profession during the early 1900s) and medical equipment belonging to Dr. Jean Mackay-Glidden, the first female physician in Mount Carroll.

Beyond the Miles rooms, exhibits span military history, medicine and education. Upstairs, an education history room features artifacts that resonate with younger visitors.

“It’s the history of Carroll County from room to room,” board treasurer Anne Haliotis said. “It’s what was. It’s about people who were here.”

She said the school exhibit is a favorite during annual visits by local junior high students. “Everybody has something that they really like,” Haliotis said.

The basement houses the Carroll County Genealogy Center, established in 1975, with family histories, photographs, diaries, church and school records, obituaries and assessor books that track early households and farms. Because Illinois did not require registration of births and deaths until 1916, church records are often essential.

“You can watch a family grow from having one horse to maybe having 20 cows, and many people take copies of that,” Haliotis said. “Sometimes to find out when Grandma was born or when Grandpa died, church records are the only way you can find them, so we try to gather as many as we can.”

Taken together, the exhibits reveal how differently visitors connect with the museum, depending on where their own histories intersect with the county’s past.

“Everybody’s different as far as what they’re interested in,” CCHS board member Deana Janssen said. “Sometimes we get people who come in that went to Shimer College, and are fascinated with what all we have on Shimer College, and people get fascinated about all of the stuff that we have in our medical room.”

The Carroll County Historical Society was established in 1964. It opened the Oakville Complex in 1968 and moved into the Miles House in 1982.

“Coming here will give people a feeling about what Carroll County was and is,” Appel said. “We get donations from all over Carroll County, or are related to Carroll County. People can see all different things from around Carroll County, and reminisce about what they once knew, from people to clothes to toys and furniture.”

Oakville Complex

Address: 8116 Oakville Road, Mount Carroll

Phone: 815-244-3474

Hours: by appointment

Online: historyincarrollcounty.org, Carroll County Historical Society on Facebook

The Carroll County Historical Society also operates the Oakville Complex, consisting of an 1888 schoolhouse, a pair of log cabins, a blacksmith shop and a granary located a few miles south of town. The buildings sit near one another akin to a historic village, approximating what the former community of Oakville — a predominantly Scottish settlement — was like around the turn of the 20th century. The complex is open by appointment, but an open house is held each fall and school field trips can be arranged.

The brick schoolhouse was in use until shortly after World War II. The historical society acquired it in 1968. The building and interior has been restored to resemble a typical school during the time when classes were still taught there. It is the only building original to old Oakville; the others were relocated there from other places.

The former Robbe Blacksmith Shop once was in Mount Carroll. The building has been restored to look like a period blacksmith shop, and demonstrations are held on special occasions. The McKean Granary, an 1860s storehouse for threshed grain, contains antique farm tools used for threshing. Log cabins owned by the Weitzel and Hay families give visitors a glimpse of pioneer home life. Butter making demonstrations are also held during school field trips.

That sense of connection extends beyond the Miles House and into the countryside south of Mount Carroll, where the society preserves an earlier, more rural chapter of county life.

“Out there it’s like, this is what it was like to live here,” Janssen said. “We learn from our history, so you get a feeling for what it was like — what Grandma had to do to go to school, and that kind of thing. It allows you to connect to how those people would have lived. It’s such a big difference because they were poorer than the people who lived in town.”

While the actual village of Oakville is no more, a handful of houses remain near the complex, as does the former Oakville Country Club golf course.

Savanna Cultural Center and Museum

406 Main St.

815-275-1958

Online: savannamuseum.org and Facebook

Open: Saturday and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. May through October

Opened in 2011 inside a restored mid-1800s building, the Savanna Museum and Cultural Center has three floors of permanent and rotating displays of exhibits on the city and its history, as well as artifacts from Savanna’s prominent citizens.

Highlights include the Civil War Soldier Gallery and Hometown Heroes Exhibit. Collections of instruments and other music materials from “America’s Waltz King,” Savanna-born Wayne King, are displayed, as well as exhibits about local World War I Red Cross nurse Helen Scott Hay. Savanna’s railroad history with the Milwaukee Road and Chicago, Burlington and Quincy is here, too, displayed through a 1,000-square-foot HO-scale model railroad track. There is much more to see, including artifacts from the now-closed Savanna Army Depot north of town.

The first-floor Community Room serves as a gathering space throughout the year, hosting a wide variety of programs and events, and also is available for private event rentals. These include the family-friendly Scavenger Hunt evenings and the Creativity on the Move artisan and crafter showcase. During the holiday season, the museum transforms for its Festival of Trees, running from the day after Thanksgiving through mid-December. More than 50 uniquely decorated trees, donated by local individuals, businesses, churches, and organizations, fill the first floor to create a festive and welcoming atmosphere.

Events coordinator Juliene McCormick attributes much of the museum’s successes to the dedication of the people who make it possible.

“What makes the Savanna Museum and Cultural Center special isn’t just the amazing events and exhibits, it’s the dedicated volunteers, financial supporters, and our historical society that make them possible,” McCormick said. “Every gathering turns 406 Main into a place where community comes together and connections grow.”

Live Music at the Cultural Center, now in its fifth year, has become one of Savanna’s most anticipated cultural traditions. On the final Friday of each month, from January through October, the Community Room is filled with people and music in a candlelit, nightclub-style space. Each evening offers a 90-minute performance featuring a mix of local favorites and accomplished Chicago-area musicians. Chicago cultural icon and Poetry Slam founder Marc Kelly Smith hosts the night, often sharing his own poetry and inviting audience members to read during intermission.

“As the monthly Live Music at the Savanna Museum and Cultural Center enters its fifth year, I reflect that the joy comes not just from the excellent musicians’ performances, but also from watching the community come together in mutual enjoyment and appreciation,” McCormick said, as well as “working alongside dedicated volunteers and the concert series’ incomparable host, Poetry Slam performer, Marc Kelly Smith.”

The Stone House Park

State Route 78 and State Street, Mount Carroll

815-244-4424

Open: by appointment

Built in 1841 along the banks of what was then-known as the Wakarusa River (now Carroll Creek), the David Emmert Stone House stands as the oldest surviving home in Mount Carroll, and one of its most hard-won preservation successes. Constructed of local limestone by early settler David Emmert, the house was the second residence in town and a witness to Mount Carroll’s earliest growth, fueled by the nearby waterway.

Over time, shifting ground, road construction and repeated flooding took a heavy toll on the house. By the early 2000s, it had been abandoned and badly deteriorated. A devastating flood in 2006 tore away entire walls, collapsed the roof and left the house a broken shell. The city planned a demolition, but a group of residents refused to let Mount Carroll’s oldest surviving home disappear.

Volunteers formed the Mount Carroll Community Development Corporation, raised private funds and began a restoration that stretched across roughly 15 years. Replacement limestone was donated from a local farm, and volunteers carefully fit new blocks alongside original stone, stabilizing walls and rebuilding what nature had erased. By 2014, the house was structurally sound, complete with a restored roof, windows and a natural spring in the lower level that once provided refrigeration and running water.

Today, the Stone House is part of a public park at the corner of Route 78 and State Street. Inside, a glass walkway creates a “dollhouse” view of the home’s original layout, allowing visitors to see all levels at once, from social spaces below to bedrooms above, furnished with period pieces.

Thomson Depot Museum

907 West Main St,, Thomson

Open: 1 to 4 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays from Memorial Day to Labor Day

Online: Facebook

Like many small communities, the railroad helped shape the city of Thomson: If the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy had gone through the then-larger community of Bluffville, just a mile east, in the mid-1880s, then Thomson would likely have become a forgotten dot on the map. Thomson’s passenger depot, which is the last of its kind remaining in Carroll County, shares the town’s railroad history.

The depot was restored in 1986 more than 30 years after the last passengers used it. Today, it houses local artifacts and railroad memorabilia, and a new annex to the museum opened in May 2025. The CB&Q was one of two north-south lines that went through Thomson, as the Milwaukee Road also had a line that ran from Savanna to the Quad Cities, paralleling the CB&Q.

On the fourth Saturday of May, the Thomson Depot Days is centered around the depot; this year’s event is May 26. More details on this year’s event will be announced on the museum’s Facebook page. Past events have included live music, special tours and the honoring of current and former railroad workers.

Milwaukee Road train car

Main Street and Broderick Drive, Savanna

Phone: 815-238-5654

Open: noon to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday from Memorial Day to Labor Day, or by appointment

Savanna was a major hub for the Milwaukee Road (officially named the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad), dispersing rail traffic from both the Chicago and Milwaukee areas throughout the west across the Mississippi River. The company had a large yard on the south end of town until the 1980s, but the Milwaukee Road’s story in Savanna continues to be told inside Hiawatha passenger car No. 541 — once part of the company’s Hiawatha passenger car fleet in the mid-20th century. The car, in service for around 20 years before decommissioning in 1971, also gives visitors a look at what rail travel was like during that era. It is one of only 16 Hiawatha cars that remain in existence.

Acquired for restoration into a museum in 1984 and operated by volunteer staff, the car is located about 500 feet from where the roundhouse used to be (the Canadian Pacific railroad currently runs on the former east-west Milwaukee Road line). Also on site is a restored ice wagon that helped keep the Milwaukee Road’s refrigerator cars cold, as well as a crossing signal.