1897 Clark County Jail Museum

The 1897 Clark County Jail Museum was founded and created by the Clark County Historical Society Inc. in 1978.  In 2008, the Jail Museum was separately incorporated as the 1897 Clark County Jail Museum, Inc.

Visitors begin their tour in the beautiful Victorian home where each Clark County Sheriff and his family lived (1897 to 1974).  These families would bring all of their own furniture and personal items with them when they moved in, and then when that Sheriff’s term of office was completed, they would take all of their belongings with them.

Today, the residence is filled with period furniture, art, books, musical instruments, as well as personal and household items that have all been donated to the Museum for display.     The Jail portion of the Museum, in use from 1897 to 1978, was home for all Clark County WI prisoners and the Sheriff’s Department. Today it is filled with vintage law enforcement items and records, local historic items and a military floor.

Exhibits and Collections include: Victorian furniture, vintage law enforcement and antique household  items, clothes, children’s toys, One-room schools, old barber shop, Dr.’s office, judges’ office, jewelry shop, WI Civil War and other military exhibit, antique radios & TVs, logging history, photographs, local government records, family history files, books, and more!

Source: 1897 Clark County Jail Museum website