The Homelife Gallery houses the Museum’s collection of antique and vintage artifacts that were popular to everyday life in the 19th and 20th Centuries.
Visitors will find a variety of inventions that were once used for entertainment and pleasure during this time period. Of homelife significance is our working music box collection with the earliest piece dated as 1885.
Another highlight of this gallery is a delightful 1940s kitchen vignette designed by the Museum’s real experts-volunteers who grew up in that era. Their role in the development of the kitchen setting was important in that the scene was created from memories of their own kitchens from childhood. Today’s children are amazed when they see an actual rotary phone and an original “ice box”. The kitchen reminds visitors of just how far we have come since the days of Victory Gardens and ration books.
A part of this gallery which is unique to our museum is a bedroom suite which belonged to Henry Greene Cole, a northern sympathizer who owned the Marietta Hotel during the Civil War. He was the son-in-law of Dix and Louisa Fletcher, owners of the Kennesaw House, and his support of the union was the reason the building was not burned by Sherman’s Forces. The display features his bedroom furniture which is distinctive because of the reverse glass painting on each piece.
Loved for its beautiful architecture, the old Marietta Courthouse was torn down in the 1960s and replaced with our more modern structure that exists today. Preserved pieces from that original structure are housed here including the jury rail, courtroom furniture and old record books detailing court proceedings from the past.