![County Courthouse Historic Westville](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/29/County_Courthouse_Historic_Westville.jpg)
Historic Westville is a
history museum
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these i ...
representing a 19th-century Georgia town in
Columbus, Georgia
Columbus is a consolidated city-county located on the west-central border of the U.S. state of Georgia. Columbus lies on the Chattahoochee River directly across from Phenix City, Alabama. It is the county seat of Muscogee County, with which it ...
,
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
.
Westville is a re-creation of a historic village with 17 furnished
antebellum
Antebellum, Latin for "before war", may refer to:
United States history
* Antebellum South, the pre-American Civil War period in the Southern United States
** Antebellum Georgia
** Antebellum South Carolina
** Antebellum Virginia
* Antebellum ...
buildings. In the future, 14 more will be moved to their new site. The buildings were moved onto the museum site in Columbus to create an authentic village environment. Westville preserves, demonstrates, and interprets the life and culture of 19th century South Georgia. This is accomplished by maintaining an authentic village environment, collecting and preserving artifacts, demonstrating traditional work skills, and workshops and special events. Every day, "townspeople" in period dress demonstrate
woodworking
Woodworking is the skill of making items from wood, and includes cabinet making (cabinetry and furniture), wood carving, woodworking joints, joinery, carpentry, and woodturning.
History
Along with Rock (geology), stone, clay and animal parts, ...
,
dressmaking
A dressmaker, also known as a seamstress, is a person who makes custom clothing for women, such as dresses, blouses, and evening gowns. Dressmakers were historically known as mantua-makers, and are also known as a modiste or fabrician.
Notab ...
,
blacksmithing, and other skills from the mid-19th century. Buildings include a courthouse, churches, stores, craft shops, and residences.
Westville moved to
Columbus, Georgia
Columbus is a consolidated city-county located on the west-central border of the U.S. state of Georgia. Columbus lies on the Chattahoochee River directly across from Phenix City, Alabama. It is the county seat of Muscogee County, with which it ...
from
Lumpkin, Georgia
The city of Lumpkin is the county seat of Stewart County, Georgia, United States. Per the 2020 census, the population was 891.
History
This area of Georgia was inhabited by succeeding cultures of indigenous Native Americans for thousands of ...
and re-opened June 22, 2019.
Brief history of John Word West
The history of Westville is connected to Lt. Col.
John Word West, a history professor at
North Georgia College
The University of North Georgia (UNG) is a public senior military college with multiple campuses in Georgia. It is part of the University System of Georgia. The university was established on January 8, 2013 by a merger of North Georgia College ...
in
Dahlonega
The city of Dahlonega () is the county seat of Lumpkin County, Georgia, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 5,242, and in 2018 the population was estimated to be 6,884.
Dahlonega is located at the north end of ...
. West was born in 1876 at a critical time of change in Georgia due to dramatic economic and social changes caused by the recent
American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
(1861–65). Also, the great changes were brought on by the new growth of
Atlanta
Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...
and the subsequent decline of farming. As a child West spent many hours listening to his grandparents talk about the old way of life that was disappearing. West listened intently and absorbed the stories and learned the old skills. Later he would convert those experiences into his own museum where he preserved those stories and old skills. A high school and college teacher, West committed himself and his own money in 1928 to saving "Georgiana" - the buildings, tools, furniture, and work skills of Georgia's settlement. He admired the work of two other Americans who also took history into their own hands: Rockefeller and Ford.
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. (Standard Oil Company) had started
Colonial Williamsburg
Colonial Williamsburg is a living-history museum and private foundation presenting a part of the historic district in the city of Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation has 7300 employees at this location and ...
in Virginia in 1927.
Henry Ford
Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American industrialist, business magnate, founder of the Ford Motor Company, and chief developer of the assembly line technique of mass production. By creating the first automobile that mi ...
(automobile maker) had started
Greenfield Village
The Henry Ford (also known as the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation and Greenfield Village, and as the Edison Institute) is a history museum complex in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn, Michigan, United States. The museum collection contains ...
in
Dearborn, Michigan
Dearborn is a city in Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 census, it had a population of 109,976. Dearborn is the seventh most-populated city in Michigan and is home to the largest Muslim population in the United States pe ...
in 1928. West engaged both men for advice and may have even traded artifacts with Ford.
Then, in 1928 John West opened "The Fair of 1850" on old Highway 41 in
Jonesboro, Georgia
Jonesboro is a city in and the county seat of Clayton County, Georgia, United States. The population was 4,724 as of the 2010 census.
The city's name was originally spelled Jonesborough. During the Civil War, the final skirmish in the Atlanta Cam ...
, about twenty miles south of Atlanta. For West, the Fair was the Deep South version of Williamsburg and Greenfield Village. From 1932 to 1934, he moved the oldest buildings in his collection to the Fair's site. One of those buildings he moved to Jonesboro was his grandparents log house that he spent so much time in as a youth. Perhaps just as importantly, he and others demonstrated the "old-fashioned" crafts for the visitors - woodworking, cloth-making, open-hearth cooking, shoe-making, and the like.
West's cause was greater than his teacher's salary. It also turned out to be larger than the vision of Georgia's political leadership. West tried and failed to get the State to take over his project before he died in 1961.
Westville's Lumpkin Era
![Blacksmith Historic Westville](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/Blacksmith_Historic_Westville.jpg)
However, the Fair was far from finished. Its rescue came from deep within rural Georgia and not from state government in Atlanta. Five years after West's death, the citizens of Stewart County decided to create a new industry---heritage tourism. Stewart County was at the time making a transition away from its traditional agricultural economy. The county still had many buildings and artifacts from the pre-Civil War days. It also had people who had grown up with the handicrafts that West loved. In some respects, then, the Stewart County of 1850 still existed in 1966.
![Historic Westville Dressmaker](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Historic_Westville_Dressmaker.jpg)
The salvation of the West collection came from a colleague who know John West, and probably spent time as a youth at his Fair of 1850 - Dr. Joseph Mahan, curator of the Columbus Museum of Arts and Crafts (now
Columbus Museum). Mahan took on the saving of West's legacy as his personal mission. Over dinner one evening at the Singers, Mahan explained the West Collection and his vision for the creation of a village where historic houses could be moved and saved, historic crafts and trades performed, and employ locals in the process. With much encouragement and leadership from Joseph Mahan, he received for the museum the donation of 59 acres of land on the south side of Lumpkin. Thus the establishment of Westville Historic Handicrafts in June, 1966.
![Singer Parlor](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Singer_Parlor.jpg)
By 1969, the new museum had purchased the West Collection and opened to the public in Spring 1970. The six oldest buildings at the Jonesboro site were moved to Westville, along with many West artifacts. The rest of the collection has been assembled mostly by donation from many different people. In 2001 Westville Historic Handicrafts became Historic Westville with the goal of expanding interpretation from handicrafts to interpreting living history, demonstrations and crafts while telling the story of west Georgia history.
Westville's executive board chairman, Tripp Blankenship, had been seriously considering moving the living history museum to
Columbus, Georgia
Columbus is a consolidated city-county located on the west-central border of the U.S. state of Georgia. Columbus lies on the Chattahoochee River directly across from Phenix City, Alabama. It is the county seat of Muscogee County, with which it ...
. A protest against the plan was staged on October 23, 2014. As of July 2016, the Lumpkin site was closed.
New site
Historic Westville reopened on June 22, 2019 in Columbus, GA. The site is open Wednesday-Sunday to the public and offers school programs and field trips. Plans to expand interpretation and move other buildings from the Lumpkin site are being set in motion as funding allows.
Today, John West's contribution is appreciated in a larger context. With the exception of a few years in the 1960s, West's project has demonstrated "Georgiana" to the public continuously since 1928. Historic Westville therefore can rightly claim to be rooted in the third-oldest living-history project in America. Westville remains the lasting legacy of John West.
As of October 2019, Historic Westville has live demonstrations and crafting interpreters every day. They are dressed in clothing accurate for the time of 1840-1860. Their living historians engage the public with dialogue about living in South Georgia during the 19th century. Emphasis lies on the unique and diverse stories of the people that made the area of South Georgia their home.
Historic Westville currently has five interpreters that are skilled in traditional trades. Leatherworking and boot making are shown in the Singer Boot Shop, while South Georgia quilting is in the Singer House. Traditional carpentry is in West Wood Shop, while Blacksmithing is in the Woodruff Blacksmith Shop. Westville is also home to a dressmaker that hand stitches all of the clothing worn by employed interpreters at the site. Open hearth cooking will be available early winter 2019. Historic methods and techniques are used by the craftspeople. Tools from the time period are on display in the houses and occasionally, still used.
See also
*
List of museums in Georgia (U.S. state)
This list of museums in Georgia contains museums which are defined for this context as institutions (including nonprofit organizations, government entities, and private businesses) that collect and care for objects of cultural, artistic, scienti ...
References
External links
Official website of Westville
{{coord, 32.3818, -84.9578
1966 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)
Living museums in Georgia (U.S. state)
Open-air museums in Georgia (U.S. state)
Museums established in 1966
Museums in Stewart County, Georgia
Rural history museums in Georgia (U.S. state)