In 1984, long time Norfolk resident Hazel Smith wanted the town to establish a museum.  She contacted Norfolk attorney Lee Turner for help, and he contacted Town Historian Leon Burnap who began  exploring the possibility of getting a building and requesting the town government get involved.  The town supervisor at that time was Dr. Richard Merchant.  The town government was in favor of pursuing.  An ad-hoc committee of local townspeople was assembled to locate a possible building.  The old Post Office building was available and was selected as the desired building.  This was recommended to the town supervisor.  The town board approved the purchase of the building. The Post Office building was built after the 1915 fire in which both sides of the street burned to the ground.
    Many volunteers worked to ready the building for the museum.  Mrs. Jean Young was appointed to be the curator.  She spent a lot of time setting up displays and marking them.  Many items were donated by past and present Norfolk residents. Many "Norfolk" items were given by whoever owned them at the time.  When Mrs. Young retired and in the fall of 1993, the town board approved the remodeling of the building.  The project was contracted out.  The main reason was putting in a new floor and foundation.  Many more hours of volunteer work was done.  We moved back in during the year 1994.
    On February 3, 1999, an adjacent building burned and the museum suffered a lot of damage.  However most of the artifacts were saved.  A new building was constructed in the summer of 2000 in downtown Norfolk across the street from the old post office.  The beautiful new museum is now open on Tuesdays and Thursdays from noon-5:00p.m. year round.

Norfolk Historical Museum
42 1/2 West Main Street
Norfolk, N.Y. 13667
384-4575
Open Tuesday and Thursday Noon-5:00 p.m. year round

Mailing Address:
Norfolk Town Historian , Leon Burnap
105 River Road
Norfolk, N.Y. 13667
384-3136
norfolk@bluefrog.com

Norfolk Historical Association
President-Marcia Wing
Vice President-Tony Nocerino
Secretary/Treasurer-Ann Todd

Church Record Site
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~stlawrchurch/index.html 		Cemeteries within Norfolk
http://stlawrencecountycemeteries.org

maintained by K. Virginia & Billy Bond  copyright 1999 - 2006
last updated 18 January 2006
Any queries can be sent to bvbond@twcny.rr.com