By Meghan E. Gattignolo The Customs House Museum & Cultural Center’s mission is to collect, preserve, and interpret items from Clarksville and Montgomery County for future generations. Visitors can be sure just about every item saved in the museum’s collection or on display in the historical exhibits say something about the local area. Among other…
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News
Thomas Dabney Mabry Creative Writing Contest Winner: Chrissy Hicks, Rising Local Author
By Meghan E. Gattignolo Clarksville, Tennessee, has its own prestigious award for creative writing. Thomas Dabney Mabry, Jr. was a published short story author from Clarksville who won the O. Henry Award in 1954 for his story “The Indian Feather”. He graduated from Harvard in 1925, and was an editor for Time magazine. Rightfully so,…
Ghosts of Austin Peay State University
By Meghan E. Gattignolo The city of Clarksville is 240 years old. A place with such deep history hides few corners where no one has ever tread. Particularly in downtown, you’ll be hard-pressed to walk a path not traveled by many people hundreds of years before. Every place in Clarksville has history, and maybe a secret or two. …
From the Collection: Greenwood Cemetery Receiving Vault Door
By Meghan E. Gattignolo Spooky season has fallen heavily upon us once more, and what’s spookier than spending a little time in a cemetery on a chilly fall day? I asked Curator of Collections Matthew Sarnelli to suggest an item from the collection to be the subject of this article. Matthew’s pick: A large heavy metal…
Meet Kim Raines: Lead Visitor Services Associate and Tour Guide Extraordinaire
By Meghan E. Gattignolo When asked what her favorite story is from the Customs House Museum & Cultural Center’s cemetery tours, Kim Raines doesn’t have to think about it too hard: “My favorite is probably Blanche Lewis and Augustus Tarwater, because I think it’s interesting that Clarksville has its own little tale of star-crossed lovers.” Like many…
Mason Rudolph: The Man and the Golf Course
By Meghan E. Gattignolo A new exhibit in the Museum’s Challenges and Champions Sports Gallery remembers legendary golf professional Mason Rudolph. Local golfers know the name well, both for the man himself, and the neighborhood golf course bearing his name. The exhibit is timely, as Clarksville is in the midst of debates over the future of the…
Life is Art: Transforming Clutter into Creativity
By Meghan E. Gattignolo The Customs House Museum & Cultural Center is happy to represent many artistic identities in Clarksville, as well as being a bastion for history and fantastic family times! To this end, celebrating creativity in all its beautiful forms is an important part of why we love our local museum. But when…
Don’t Let the Skies Go Silent: See the AFC’s Silent Skies Mural in Clarksville Today
By Meghan E. Gattignolo Here in Tennessee, we love our birds. Our state bird – the mockingbird – requires effort to love and often gets a bad reputation. Watching them, though, you have to admire their tenacity and clever ability to adapt to changes in their environment. However, today it’s easy to worry that our local bird…
Annual Museum Staff Art Show Arrives August 1!
By Meghan E. Gattignolo The legend that is The Customs House Museum & Cultural Center’s Annual Staff Art Exhibit is coming back! This exhibit is a unique addition to Clarksville’s local museum, a special chance to see what the creative staff that works behind the scenes can do. This exhibit has been going for more than…
Dunbar Cave: Clarksville’s Oldest Sacred Space Featured in the Museum’s Sundays @ 3
By Meghan E. Gattignolo When you do get a chance to walk through Dunbar Cave again, one thing the guides will ask is some variation of the question: What in your life do you consider sacred? A church is a sacred place to many, but some people find their grandmother’s kitchen equally so. A stadium…