Visit

Visit the Watkins Museum of History:

Visit the Watkins Museum! Housed in a beautiful, historic building on the corner of 11th and Massachusetts Streets, the Watkins showcases unique and fascinating stories from Douglas County’s past.  Admission is free to the public.

Hours:

Tuesday-Saturday: 10am-4pm
Monday-Sunday: CLOSED

What You’ll Experience:

The museum’s core exhibits tell stories of the people and events that shaped the areas we know today as Lawrence and Douglas County, Kansas. The second floor explores struggles for equality, from the founding of Lawrence through the early 21st century. Prominently featured are artifacts and interactives related to Bleeding Kansas, Quantrill’s Raid during the Civil War, and the fight against slavery. Third floor exhibits chronicle different themes in Douglas County life, including business, leisure, activism, sports, and more. The museum also has four temporary exhibit spaces that change every 3-6 months.

The second floor features Territorial period and Civil War era artifacts. The exhibits continue with a look at the struggle of equality in the century between the end of Reconstruction and the civil rights movement of the 1960s.
Interactive exhibits on the second floor help visitors explore Quantrill’s 1863 raid, life in early Lawrence, and the causes that have been a call to action for county residents from the 1960s to the early 2000s.
Artifacts, photographs, maps, audio, and video bring stories of Lawrence’s past to life on the third floor.
Hands-on artifacts, including an 1870s playhouse and 1960s telephone switchboard, allow visitors of all ages to experience the past firsthand.

Parking:

Metered street parking is available directly in front of the museum on Massachusetts Street and beside the facility on 11th Street. Free two-hour parking is also available at a public lot on Vermont Street.

Location:

The third floor chronicles life in Douglas County from the 1800s to the early 2000s and Lawrence’s transformation from frontier town to midwestern city.
The third floor features some of the museum’s most iconic artifacts, including a 1920s Milburn Electric Car and a desk used by James Naismith, the inventor of basketball.

Watkins Museum Code of Conduct