The Canton Historical Society opened the Canton Historical Museum in 1970. This 15,000 sq. ft. three-story frame shop (41 x 122 feet) was built in 1865, supported with large chestnut beams. The building was originally used to assemble, paint, crate, and store curved cast steel agricultural plowshares. These plows, built under Francis F. Smith’s patent, were of great strength, which easily turned over the hard soil in the Midwest. Red, black, and silver paint can still be seen on a portion of the first floor of the Museum. Beginning in 1918, companies such as John Deere, Ford and General Motors began manufacturing gasoline powered tractors. These “Iron Horses” soon replaced the horse-drawn plows. By 1924, the Collins Company ceased making plows.
In 1924, the building name was changed to the “Bowling Alleys”, and it became a recreation hall for company employees when the porches and fieldstone fireplaces were added. This hall contained six duckpin bowling alleys, a card and lounging room, a lunch and cigar counter, a reading room, a women’s parlor, shower baths, and a 75foot-long rifle range with four targets in the basement. Portions of the bowling alley wooden gutters can still be seen today in the “Train Diorama” room on the second floor.
Fred Widen, a patternmaker for the Company, donated his collection of Company memorabilia (3,500 artifacts). In 1940, it became the “Collinsville Museum of Connecticut.” His Wooden Scrapbook contains newspaper articles from the early 1900s to 1950, which are now digitally scanned.
The Canton Historical Society, Inc. received a deed with lien from Tom Perry in 1968 and opened the Museum to the public in 1970. On April 25, 2005, the Canton Historical Society became the owner of the Canton Historical Museum building. Thanks to the generous donation of $200,000 by Barbara Elston Lowell, daughter of the last Collins Company President, Clair Elston, and a long-time member and volunteer of the Canton Historical Society, Inc. Coupled with James “Rusty” Tilney giving up ownership rights worth $325,000, the Canton Historical Society was able to have full control of the building.
Today this Museum includes: Collins Company axes, tools and history; Victorian period music boxes, 1800 Loom, bedroom and toys; Blacksmith Shop; General Store with Post Office; Barbershop; 1854 Button Fire Engine; Bridal Parlor; Vintage Dresses; Native American artifacts from the Thomas Dyer farm and George Plude; Lowell Canton Golf Course exhibit; Charles Harrington photography (1890–1920) and glass negatives; William Edgar Simonds Congressional Medal of Honor and Veterans exhibits; Grange exhibit; Farmington Valley Band exhibit; Company Print Shop; Ice Harvesting exhibit; 19 th Century Farm Equipment; and a Gift Shop.