Massena N.Y. Town Museum - Part 1

I'd been told that the Massena Museum had moved to a beautiful new building so I went to have a look for myself. Indeed, they'd moved to a former bank building right in downtown Massena. I parked and went in to see what had changed:

And it was magnificent, very deluxe. This was certainly not like the old museum!

They had some bronze sculptures and paintings on loan from the Frederic Remington Museum in Ogdensburg and, to my surprise, I remembered all of them from when I toured that museum in 2015. This sculpture was entitled, "Bronco Buster," done in 1895:

I remembered this painting also. It was called "An Old Time Plains Fight," oil on canvas, 1904:

Another bronze sculpture by Frederic Remington, "Trooper Of The Plains," 1868:

"Charge Of The Rough Riders," oil on canvas, 1898:

If you would like to see more of Frederic Remington's art, here are links to my visit to the Remington Museum in Ogdensburg, NY in 2015:
Part 1,     Part 2,     Part 3

I then proceeded into the rooms devoted to Massena History which, I was told, were arranged in approximate historical order. I started with the oldest:

Massena was a pioneer town and had a long rural history as the artifacts indicated:

There were lots of tools from early life in mining, manufacturing, lumbering and farming:

I was particularly taken by these three hand made dolls, displayed in a bushel basket. At least they looked hand made to me, with intricate faces and elaborate costumes. There was no sign to give me an estimated date, but they were among the oldest items in the collection:

This was not a spinning wheel, though it may have been made from one. It was a Quiller, used to fill bobbins for a loom in the early 1800s:

I was stopped in my tracks by this tall, cast iron pillar and was surprised to learn that it was erected in 1842 as a treaty marker to commemorate the Ashburton Treaty, settling the dispute between the U.S. and Canada in the War of 1812. But there was a lot more to see, and I'll post Part 2 tomorrow: