The Cedarburg Cultural Center: Where Art, Music and History Thrive. It’s our slogan, and we revel in it—as an organization and as Cultural Center members—daily. That makes me proud, and it makes me happy. We seem to create and recreate ourselves almost hourly! I guess you shouldn't expect anything less than rampant creativity from an arts organization. Check out our website or—better yet—stop by and see what’s new at the Center.

But we’re equally proud of what’s old at the Center!

The CCC curates and maintains the General Store Museum located at the Cedarburg Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Center building a few blocks south of us on Washington Avenue. The 1860s era building is home to the Roger C. Christensen collection of advertising art and antique packaging, dating from the first four decades of the 1900s. It’s also home to a whole lot of very old candy! I’m always drawn to the candy counter and those jars of vintage lemon drops and packages of Necco wafers. What exactly is the shelf life of a Necco wafer? 

Our Kuhefuss House Museum, an 1849 Greek Revival structure is north of the Cultural Center on Washington Avenue and was home to five generations of the Kuhefuss family. Seriously, I think it’s noteworthy just from the perspective that they had five daughters and only one bathroom…which, given Wisconsin winters, was a significant improvement from the original outhouse. The home underwent a few “modernizations” in its 160 years (they never did add a second bathroom) but is preserved largely as it was when the family lived there. CCC volunteers open the Kuhefuss House for guided tours during the summer months and during the winter holiday season.

The CCC also stewards a 1920s-era schoolroom a few blocks south of the Kuhefuss House in the Lincoln Building. For a large number of visitors, it’s a trip down memory lane. For the large number of school children who visit there yearly, it’s a living history lesson. (The schoolroom is open by appointment only. Please contact us.)

You can’t really have a discussion about Cedarburg history without talking about the Noel and Judy Jepson Collection. Spanning approximately 100 years, the collection is still a work in progress and labor of love for Judy. Artifacts include anything and just about everything made or manufactured in Cedarburg including 17 Mercury Marine outboard motors, local advertising signage, paintings, and reams of documentation on Cedarburg citizens. At a recent meeting with Judy, we tried to estimate the amount of space it would take to properly display it all, and we guessed at around 3,000 square feet of floor space and an equal amount of wall space!

Judy very generously wishes to donate the collection to a nonprofit organization that can properly curate it. We are helping her find exhibit space, and a committee has been formed to assist. A number of creative ideas have been vetted including displaying small portions of the collection on a rotating basis at the CCC or the library, or finding a larger, permanent museum space to present a majority of these artifacts as well as other Cedarburg memorabilia from local collectors. Obviously funding is a huge issue; facility maintenance and staff costs are ongoing expenses that could dwarf the initial cost of procuring space. But even in this challenging economy, the attitude around the table is hugely optimistic. We will find a way to preserve local history and make it accessible to the public. Because that’s what we do.

This is the place where art, music and HISTORY thrive!