Traveling Trunk

Our Traveling Trunk and accompanying lesson materials provide a standards-based, cross-curricular exploration of Civil War-era life for a middle-class family living in Marietta, Georgia. Students analyze primary documents and artifacts to interpret facts about three members of the Root family. The trunk contains reproductions of actual letters and objects relevant to each family member.  

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Video  Resources

These videos were created by the William Root House Museum to show local celebrities and modern-day historians putting their skills to the test with an array of 19th century challenges and tasks. We hope you'll enjoy them! You can watch all of our videos below, or you can view them on YouTube! 
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​Preparing a Meal

Food historians and living history demonstrators Clarissa Clifton and Misha Harp show how a quick meal could be prepared during the 1850s using simple and readily available ingredients like cornmeal and greens.

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​Hosting a Tea Party

We asked our friends from Tiny Bubbles Tea Bar to come set a table for a Victorian tea party. The challenge? They had to follow strict instructions taken from Mrs. Crowen's American Lady's Cookery Book, published in the 1860s.

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​Trying Popular Foods

​We asked local food historians to prepare popular recipes from the 19th century. Watch to see what our taste testers thought when they tried dandelion greens, cow tongue and ​oxtail stew, and vinegar pie!

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Baking aN Apple  Pie

​Lauren Bolden, expert pie baker and owner of Pie Bar, came to the Root House to try baking an apple pie using a recipe from 1845. Oh, and she baked the pie using our 1850s cast ​iron wood burning cookstove. Watch to see how it went!

Field  Trips

The Root House is happy to offer discounted admission to groups of 10 or more. We offer both guided and self-guided tour experiences for student field trips, homeschool groups, charter bus tours, senior groups and more. Our gardens or indoor meeting space offer a wonderful spot for lunch, or visit the nearby Marietta Square Market for a variety of food options. ​

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