The Erie Canal Museum

The museum displays over 50,000 items: tools, canal boat equipment, models, furnishings, household items, costumes, sketches, drawings, paintings, photographs, rare books, maps, receipts and manuscripts.

Then we could go outside the main building into an enclosed room, and step on to a life-size replica of a canal boat, called the Frank Buchanan Thomson.

Back inside the building, we took an elevator up one floor. The fully painted elevator looked as if one was standing on the bow of a canal ship.

Above, a canal master is at his desk. He is no doubt working out the fee for a certain canal barge that is in the weighlock. Extra trunks are on display, samples of what a passenger might use to travel with.

Above is a blue wedding dress, an 1886 classic fashion style during its day. White was not worn yet for that special day. This type of dress was intended to also be worn for other social and formal occasions after the wedding.

Shown above is a hair wreath. To the modern viewer, this might seem peculiar and a bit eerie, but during the Victorian era, it was a customary art, made as a memorial and a token of love. A small amount of hair was taken from the most recent deceased of the family and usually fashioned into a flower, and hung from the center. This remained until another relative died, and then it was moved to the side and made part of the outer décor of the wreath.

One is left to wonder how marvelous it must have been to cruise down the Erie Canal and see the world go by.