The Society & the Site

The Tonganoxie Community Historical Society is a non-profit organization started in 1981 to bring together those interested in the history of our community.  The first officers were president, John Cass Lenahan; Vice-President, Jack Angell; Secretary, Margaret Gallagher; Treasurer, Mike Emery. Our community is defined as the area encompassed by Unified School District 464 .  

The Society owns and operates 10 acres – called the Site -  and 4 buildings: The Honey Valley School, Reno Methodist Church, Fairchild/Knox Dairy barn and milk parlor and fire house.

The Site is located at  201 W. Washington, Tonganoxie, Kansas. Our mission statement is to discover, collect, preserve, display and make accessible to the public any and all objects that reflect the history of our community.

 We are governed by a Board of Directors (5) and elected officers (4). The organization is staffed by volunteers except for a part time (6 hours a week) curator.   Our key group of dedicated volunteers numbers fifteen.  There are currently approximately 125 members. 

Educational programs for local schools are conducted by our school coordinator. Programs may include history in a one room school house,  a silent movie,  genealogy, historical artifacts, and a tour of the museum.

We are funded by membership dues, donations and fund-raisers, and for the first time in our history by a small grant in 2007 from the Leavenworth County Board of Commissioners.  

Although we have a few family histories at the Site, we do not have the staff to answer questions about genealogy.