The Johnson County Museum of History opens “200 Years of Franklin,” its bicentennial exhibit focusing on the city, with a celebration on Thursday. The exhibit looks at the people, places and occasions that have made Franklin what it is today.
RYAN TRARES | DAILY JOURNAL
The swampy land between Youngs Creek and Camp Creek was their stopping point.
George King had come up from Kentucky in 1822 looking to purchase land in the newly opened territory. When King came to the confluence of the two creeks, he felt it was an ideal place to start a community, and purchased it.
“It was found to be covered by a fine growth of beech, sugar tree, ash, walnut and poplar timber, while a tangled thicket of enormous spice brush grew up from underneath,” according to accounts of King’s findings in “A Historical Sketch of Johnson County, Indiana” by D.D. Banta.
So begins the story of Franklin, which was soon established as the Johnson County seat. The community has grown into a thriving example of a modern small town, where historic buildings and homes sit next to new developments and community features.
Officials at the Johnson County Museum of History have told both stories in its newest exhibit, “200 Years of Franklin,” which opens Thursday.
Weaving together two centuries of history with Franklin’s revival and constant evolution, the exhibit focuses on the foundational aspects of the city, such as King’s arrival to the area and early businesses, while unearthing interesting tidbits that many local residents may not know.
“We hope they learn a little bit more about where they live, and this part of the county. There’s so much that we ‘know,’ but this might give them an opportunity to look deeper into that,” said David Pfeiffer, director of the museum.
In approaching the exhibit, museum planners had to walk a balance separating Franklin’s history from the overall founding of the county. Both entities celebrate their bicentennials in 2023, and with Johnson County being featured in an exhibit later in the year, they were challenged to leave some aspects for later.
“There are a lot of overlapping stories, as you can imagine,” Pfeiffer said. “So we try to pick and choose which ones, waiting to focus on some stories because they’re more county-wide.”
For example, the exhibit focuses attention on the fact that Franklin is the county seat and what that means. But for how the county came together, and the organizations that grew out of it, museum staff have held off until later this year.
To tell Franklin’s story, Pfeiffer and museum curator Allison Baker divided the exhibit into three distinct areas. They started by describing the geographical area where Franklin was set, and what it was like at the beginning with King and his cohorts first stepped into it.
Early industries, such as coopers and wheel-wrights, played a big part in the development of the city.
“Those were critical in the 1820s that we don’t think about now,” Pfeiffer said. “Barrels — you had to have barrels.”
Moving through history, the exhibit looks at what makes Franklin “Franklin.” By focusing on the unique aspects of the city — Franklin College, basketball and the Wonder Five, George Crow — the exhibit spotlights the people and places that put it on the map, so to speak.
Finally, the exhibit examines how Franklin today is honoring its past and forging a new path in the future. Items, such as memorabilia advertising the Discover Downtown Franklin organization, speak to the small-town, All-American feel of the city, while also weaving in its agricultural and industrial prowess.
“We’re connecting that past to what is going on right now,” Pfeiffer said. “In a lot of exhibits, we’re so far in the past. So we want to make sure we’re bringing it up to the present.”
One aspect museum staff thought would be fun would be to connect some of the well known place-names from around Franklin to the real people those names come from.
“You hear these names all the time, but not a lot of people who the faces were behind those names. So I think we have some fun stories there, of what’s in a name,” Pfeiffer said. “We hope that’s interesting even for people who have lived in Franklin for a long time.”
The exhibit will open with a reception and bicentennial celebration from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday. The display will show until late August.
