Historic site coordinator Ryan Barland at Old Town Hall. Photos: Chris Emeott
In 2019, a cornerstone of Plymouth’s past was put in jeopardy. A burst water pipe closed Old Town Hall for the next five years. Water damage impacted the lower level of the building, historic site coordinator Ryan Barland says. “While the damage to the historic collections was minimal, a lot of work had to go into rehabbing it as a work space,” he says. But while the history center was shuttered, there was plenty going on behind closed doors.
Aside from redoing the flooring and the office space, the Plymouth History Center staff worked on an upstairs exhibit that covers Plymouth’s timeline and spans Native American history up to the 1970s.
Downstairs still houses historical collections, which have been painstakingly preserved. “Volunteers have given tremendous amounts of their time, keeping this building going and Plymouth’s history alive,” Barland says. “They’ve digitized thousands of photos, and they’ve done tons of indexing.”
One of the most popular uses of the archives is housing history, Barland says. Photos of houses are hit or miss. “Maps, however, can take you back to the 1800s,” he says. “You don’t know what you’ll find until you look.”
Volunteers have been hard at work digitizing historic photographs during the Hands on History series led by Barland.
Back in My Day
While Barland acknowledges that Plymouth’s History Center has reached its limit on what it can physically accept—it can’t take grandma’s pump organ, for example—Plymouth residents can still share their stories.
The history center’s oral history recording space is simple: a couch next to a window in the upstairs research room. “The majority of the people who use it tend to be a little older, but we’ve had some younger people as well,” Barland says.
So far, Barland has done all of the interviewing, drawing from his 15 years of experience at the Minnesota Historical Society, where his fortes were oral history and oral history interviewing.
One of Barland’s favorite stories collected at Old Town Hall was an interview with a member of the Plymouth Parks and Recreation Department. “He talked about the Millennium Garden and the origins of the Fire and Ice Winter Festival,” Barland says. “He had so much pride in his work.”
The audio recordings and transcripts go into the history center’s collections and will be drawn on in various ways. “We will use them to better tell the history of Plymouth in exhibits, books and online,” Barland says. “Researchers will also use the recordings for their own projects.”
Old Town Hall is open 11 a.m.–2 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and the first Saturday of every month.
Find additional programming at history.plymouthmn.gov.
Discover More
Plymouth’s historic site coordinator Ryan Barland will share slices of local history in our newest Noteworthy column. “My hope for the Plymouth Magazine column is to highlight all of the cool stuff we are doing here at Plymouth History Center,” he says. Look for his upcoming columns, which will explore local historic collections, provide programming announcements and offer local stories from the past.
Plymouth History Center
3605 Fernbrook Lane N; 763.509.5229
