Allen County Museum

The Allen County Museum is a history museum in Lima with several buildings and exhibition areas covering different aspects of local heritage. The grounds include a main building, a historic log house, the MacDonell House, a Shay Locomotive display, and a Children's Discovery Center.

The museum documents the Lima Locomotive Works, which became one of the three largest steam locomotive manufacturers in the United States during the 1800s. The library collection preserves thousands of photographs, construction blueprints, and documents from this important railway era.

Native American collections on display show tools, clothing, and household items that reveal how people lived in different time periods in this region. You can see objects that connect you to the communities who first inhabited this land.

Plan your visit with enough time to explore the multiple buildings and exhibits spread across the grounds, as each area offers different perspectives on local history. Comfortable shoes are helpful since you will be walking between different structures on the property.

The museum displays an intricate miniature reproduction of George Washington's Mount Vernon estate, crafted from thousands of individual pieces to show plantation life in detail. This labor-intensive model demonstrates the skill and effort required to recreate such complex historical scenes at a small scale.