Gouverneur Museum spreads to annex

GOUVERNEUR — Visitors to the Gouverneur & St. Lawrence County Fair can take away a little history whenever the grounds are open.

The fair boards have given an unused building to the Gouverneur Museum, which has turned it into an annex.

"It's a wonderful facility. We are a little crowded with duplicate-like items, so we put those there," said Joseph D. Laurenza, curator of the museum. "There is a whole table of fair stuff. That will stay over there."

Some items that were in storage at the museum's 30 Court St. location also were moved to the annex.

Fair officials decided last year to give the building, most recently used as a women's bathroom, to the museum for its use.

The building, at one time a display area for the maple syrup association and later for gems and minerals, needed renovation if it was to continue as a bathroom, said Donald A. Peck, president of the Gouverneur Agricultural and Mechanical Society.

Instead, the fair opted to replace the bathroom with portable toilets and give the building, which has a relatively new roof, to the museum. Fairs in other locations often have historical displays, Mr. Peck said.

"This is going to be a good asset to the fair," he said. "The more kinds of things we do around the fairgrounds, the better off we are."

With the help of volunteers and students from St. Lawrence-Lewis Board of Cooperative Educational Services, the annex opened for the first time July 5, when the fairgrounds were the site of the community's annual fireworks.

"I didn't know what to expect, but we had 83 people," Mr. Laurenza said.

Thirty volunteers are expected to staff the annex during fair week, which runs Monday through Aug. 8. For more information, see www.gouverneurmuseum.org.