VOLGA – A new building on the Brookings County Museum campus in Volga’s City Park will house rare horse-drawn farm equipment.
Members of the museum board of directors are seeking financial assistance to complete the building fund package.
The nearly $150,000 facility will recognize the loyal beasts of burden that powered the plows, wagons and buggies in the early years, and were helpful in the development and growth of this area from the late 1800s into the 1960s.
Construction of the Trygve A. Trooien Horse-Drawn Museum will begin June 12, according to Brookings County museum board member and project manager Phil Wagner of Brookings.
Most of the cost of the 88- by 30-foot building has been provided by a $100,000 bequest from the late Trygve A. Trooien, well-known Oak Lake Township farmer and farm historian who died in April 2015.
The remaining approximately $50,000 needed for the building will be comprised of gifts from the fund drive the Brookings County Historical Society/Museum is currently conducting.
“Every gift large and small will be very much appreciated,” according to Harold Christianson of Volga, president of the museum board.
An initial, lead gift of $5,000 in that effort has been made by former resident Arnold (Jim) Wood of Stockton, Ill. His gift was made as a memorial to his late wife, Betty Paulson Wood, a former Volga resident who died in 2016.
Planning has been completed and bids accepted to build the museum. Low bidder was Kaufmann-Ust Construction Company of Brookings.
Gary Kaufman and Steve Ust expect to start construction in early June. Completion date is fall 2017.
The new museum will display various horse-powered equipment and conveyances, some of which are already part of the museum collection, and others that are gifts from Trooien’s horse-drawn collection.
It is planned that the museum will also house other related items, such as local photographs and other historical, workhorse related equipment and documents.
Persons and businesses wishing to help in construction of the new museum building may send their tax-exempt gifts to the Brookings County Museum, Box 872, Brookings, S.D. 57006.
