History, Historical Society

The Isanti County Historical Society promotes Isanti County history by funding research, programming, outreach, education and displays. Our vision is to be a visible organization that makes Isanti County history alive and accessible to a diverse audience.

We are located in the ICHS Heritage Center which contains a museum, office for research, archive and artifact storage, a community hall and kitchen. On the grounds is a partially restored late 1800's log cabin.

Culture, General, History, Historic House, Park, Specialized

The Ironhorse Central Railroad Museum is located in Chisago City, MN and has been in this present location since 1966. Richard and Robert Thompson and Doug Alexander started back in the 1950's collecting memorabilia, taking photos and going on MRA fan trips. They purchased engine # 4 in 1963 and had it stored until 1966 when it was moved to the present location. Track construction was started that year and in 1984 the circle was completed and a final spike ceremony was held celebrating the event. A documentary called "Ironhorse" was filmed from 1983 to 1984 and has been featured on television multiple times. In those years we had many newspaper articles and were shown on local news programs. We have almost a mile of track in a circle so we can run our equipment around.

History, Historic House, Historical Society

We tell our county history starting with the wolly mammoth tusk found in 2001, American Indian local story, continuing with the logging, John C. Greenway mining, the picture "GRACE", our local industry C.K. Blandin Paper Company, our own Barn Again Story and Francis Ethyl Gumm who became Judy Garland. We have a huge research center which houses over 100,000 photographs, local authors books, manuscript files and oral histories. End your tour in our own Little Gem's Gift Shop!