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Farmhouse to become St. Charles County history museum
In the early 1800s an Irish immigrant came up the Mississippi River from New Orleans and settled in rural St. Charles County.
Lawrence Cribbin bought land from another settler and built a two-story brick farmhouse amongst a grove of trees. Cribbin (also spelled Cribben) had a stock and grain farm.
Around the turn of the century, the house was sold to another farm family, the Kuhlmanns, whose front yard became a neighborhood gathering place.
By 1975, a developer bought the house for a commercial and real estate development called Heritage Landing, off the Highway 94 south outer road in St. Charles. By then, the landscape had changed.
The farmhouse was turned into a restaurant called Mr. Cribbin's Old House in 1980. Most recently, it was used as an office building.
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Soon, the historic homestead will return to its origins when crews transform it into the St. Charles County heritage museum. Construction on the museum could start in September.
The St. Charles County Parks Department purchased the 1.55-acre property in 2006 for $950,000 with the intention of turning it into a place to display the county's history.
"We haven't had a real, dedicated county museum," said county park historian Ryan Graham. "Hopefully, this will be a place to where school groups and history classes and groups will come to learn what St. Charles County was and is."
Plans for the museum have been finalized and the County Council could consider bids for contractors in August. Construction is expected to take a year, said parks and recreation Director Bettie Yahn-Kramer.
Contractors will remove the additions to the original farmhouse and build an indoor "summer kitchen" to link the brick building to a large addition that will look like a barn from the outside.
"Obviously due to the size constraints on the site we can't make it exactly how it was in the 1830s but it will certainly evoke some comparison to memories of the time," Yahn-Kramer said.
Most of the historic artifacts and displays will be in the barn, Graham said. Displays could focus on everything from the Civil War in St. Charles County to medical history to sports, he said.
The property also will serve as the trailhead for the 1.91-mile trail being built by Centennial Greenway, which will connect to the Katy Trail.
Graham said he likes that the once-popular picnic spot will return to that use.
"I think it's kind of neat to think that the park is returning back to a park," he said.
Graham will spend the next year building the museums's collection and learning more about the history of the farmhouse.
A new collection of books, videos and materials from the Institute of Museum and Library Services will help him out. The Parks Department received a grant for the IMLS bookshelf earlier this year.
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