State of the County: Marion’s history on display

Rich History on Display

BY MARK ANDERSON

Though it was named more than 175 years ago, Marion County has artifacts dating long before then, some several centuries old. Whether indigenous peoples, European explorers, early American settlers, or turn-of-the-century residents, much of that history is on display at the Marion County Museum of History and Archaeology, located at the northeast end of the McPherson Governmental Campus.

Enter the museum and you will be greeted by an array of old documents and photographs, farming gear, hunting rifles belonging to early farmers, and scores of artifacts from homes, businesses and government buildings throughout the county’s past.

Price Landrum is the museum’s president and a volunteer. All of the staff at the museum are volunteers.

Landrum spends a few days a week at the museum, giving tours and curating displays throughout the building.

“I first became involved with the museum when I joined the Marion County Historical Commission in the late 1980s when it was coming to the end of remodeling East Hall into a museum,” he explained. “I began giving tours, and my background as a teacher must have helped because I got positive feedback. I enjoyed it, so I expanded to three days a week (at the museum).”

Now, Landrum is just one member of a team of volunteers who give tours, build displays and conduct research at the museum. Exhibits at the museum range from artifacts dating back thousands of years to more recent historical pieces.

One particular piece in a display of animal bones always gets a few raised eyebrows, Landrum notes.

“Most of these were found in Silver Glen Springs,” he said. “In fact, you may find one in there that surprises you — a camel in Marion County. It’s indigenous, and it was a miniature camel.”

The display with bones and arrowheads sits next to one of the museum’s largest pieces— remnants of a large wooden canoe used by indigenous Floridians thousands of years ago that was found by chance and painstakingly restored.

“The canoe was found in Ocklawaha in the 1980s when the water was low,” he explained. “It was taken to Tallahassee and treated in sugar water for five years.”

Each section of the museum is dedicated to a different time period of Marion County’s history — maps documenting the county’s various railroad lines in the 1800s hang across the hall from a rifle used in the Second Seminole War, which is in the same room as a detailed model of the W.H. Fore Homestead in the late 1800s and early 1900s in Scrambletown.

Many of the artifacts, maps and other items displayed are donations from people throughout Marion County and the state of Florida, Landrum said.

One such donation tells the story of Ocala native Louis Dosh and the SS Ocala Victory. A soldier in World War II who Volunteer-run Marion County Museum of History and Archaeology holds hundreds of Marion County historical artifacts from time periods dating back thousands of years

died as a prisoner of war in the Pacific theater, Dosh’s story is told at the museum through photos, letters, medals and other items, even a copy of the July 4, 1938 issue of LIFE Magazine, in which Louis and his wife, Betty Drummond Bloxsom, appear on the cover.

Part of the story is that when Dosh was being held prisoner, Betty held the honor of christening a Victory ship (a special type of cargo ship built during the war) that was named the SS Ocala Victory. The wine bottle remnants and pouch used during the christening are on display at the museum.

Documenting Marion County history is a passion Landrum and other volunteers, and donations are what make the museum one of the best places to learn about Marion County and the people who lived here throughout its history.

Anyone who has an interest in local history owes it to themselves to stop by and take in everything the museum has to offer.

Mark Anderson is a public relations specialist for the Marion County Government.