The Knowlton Museum has extended its hours, making it easier for history enthusiasts to visit. Visitors can now explore the museum’s collection Tuesday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The 10,000 square-foot museum in downtown Port Huron was gifted by the Knowlton Family to the Community Foundation. Since the New Year, two inventory project co-leads, Shelly David and Emily Reitzel, have been documenting and uncovering stories from the ice industry artifacts on display, an industry gone by. 

“So many things here are one of a kind,” Reitzel said. “You can try to go to Google and research things, trying to describe anything you can about the item, and there’s nothing. They have items here that I don’t think they have anywhere else — it’s very unique.”

Guests at the Knowlton Museum will sometimes comment about their vague memories of having ice being delivered to their home, just like the milkman. In those times, delivery cards would be put in a window of your home and rotated to show the weight of the ice you wanted delivered. There were special built-in locked ice boxes on the homes that a special “skeleton” type key fit into that worked for all ice boxes. It’s these ice signs and keys that many in modern times have no knowledge of at all.

David and Reitzel have several years of experience working at Port Huron Museums and received master’s degrees in Library and Information Science from Wayne State University where they learned how to describe, research and preserve historical objects, papers, and photographs for display in museums and libraries. They are working to inventory the entire collection, estimated to be upwards of 10,000 pieces, as the museum claims to be the largest collection of ice-making equipment and memorabilia in the U.S.

“One of the treasures that we found downstairs recently was this big binder full of tool catalogs from the 1800s and 1900s,” David said. “One of the things that we will do in the future is change up the exhibit space a little bit and bring out items like this that we hope people will want to see.”

The old tool catalogs will allow guests to find out for themselves just how much the ice-cutting tools cost that were dredged from the bottoms of lakes and rivers and are now on display.

All of the treasures at the Knowlton Museum were collected from around the country by the museum’s founders Mickey and Agnes Knowlton. The collection has been open to the public since 1987 and has been in its current location since 2000. The Community Foundation is proud to continue the Knowlton’s family’s ice industry legacy through the museum as well as the Mickey & Agnes Knowlton Endowment Fund and several other charitable funds held by the family. 

Admission is currently cash only. Adults are $5, seniors age 60 and older are $4, children age 6-10 are $2 and children age 5 and under are admitted for free.

Online sales for tickets and group tour reservations coming soon. To schedule a private tour of the museum, call (810) 987-5441. For more information or to stay up-to-date with announcements, visit facebook.com/knowltonmuseum.

Read more about the Knowlton Museum at stclairfoundation.org/knowlton-family-finalizes-knowlton-ice-museum-transfer.