HERBURNE – The Sherburne Heritage Park Society (SHPS) has undertaken the lengthy task of fundraising for and building a 40 ft x 60 ft museum to house large artifacts. The construction of the museum began on May 1 and the grand opening will occur on Saturday, July 26 at SHPS' Heritage Day.

Charlotte Sherwood, Vice President of SHPS, is in charge of the project and began fundraising two years ago. Through personal donations and grant funding Sherwood was able to raise a total of $140,000.

“I've gone to the community. We got about $20,000 from the public and businesses alone,” she said. Five grant applications have been approved and one more is pending. They include the Howard K. Finch Memorial Fund, Herbert H. & Mariea L. Brown Charitable Trust Fund, The Roger Follett Foundation Inc., R.C. Smith Foundation and Sherburne NBT Bank & Trust.

The museum is designated to house a 1936 Sandford Deluxe City Service Ladder truck that was purchased by the Sherburne Fire Department in 1936 and was last used by the fire department at the East State Street block fire in 1974. There will also be a Babcock Optimus printing press that was donated by the late John McDaniel – previous owner and editor of The Sherburne News. The third artifact is an advertising sign from Howard Finch, which was used in front of Homer Kuhn's store. The sign was restored by Jo Hodges in 2012, explains a SHPS fundraising pamphlet.

“If we don't preserve history, our children won't know what our ancestors had achieved,” said Sherwood when asked why preservation is so important.

“I wanted to help the society, help the town, so they had some place to put their artifacts,” she said.

Most of the funds will be used to create the structure with any remaining monies to be used for the interior of the building. Sherwood explained that SHPS will continue to seek donations to fully finish the interior of the building, but it will serve to house the artifacts until the interior work is complete.