The Washington County Historical Society is always looking for volunteers of all ages with a variety of talents and skills to help in our library and museums at Scandia and Stillwater. Are you a musician? Do you perform a traditional skill, such as create needlepoint, churn butter, whittle wood, build boats, shoe horses, make soap, or some other old-time occupation? We could use your talents at history festivals and special events. Are you a "jack-of-all-trades"? We have general maintenance needs at our various buildings. Can you use a word processor? We need help indexing and cataloging our library and artifacts. Do you have story-telling abilities, or do you enjoy local history and would like to share it with our visitors? Our museums always need guides. Can you coordinate, organize, cashier? Your help would be put to use at WCHS. For more information, please call (651) 439-5956 or email Kirsta Benson.
Volunteers of special need: tour guides, board members, newsletter editor, contributors to newsletter, collections inventory assistants, computer data entry.
Volunteers do most of the work of the Society. Volunteers serve as tour guides, teachers, cashiers, cleaners, research assistants, editors, and reenactors. They work to maintain the collections, repair and maintain the buildings, care for gardens and grounds, decorate for special events, and help with workshops.
Volunteers serve on committees, such as membership, publicity, fundraising, and collections. They assist with research, write historical articles, give talks and demonstrations, index and edit manuscripts for publication, and enter collection records into the computer database. The vintage ball club is made up of about 20 volunteers. More than 2,000 volunteer hours go into Society activities and museums each year.