Brooks Historical Society and The Brooks Depot Museum 

Brooks Historical Society operates the Brooks Depot Museum, on the grounds of Powerland Heritage Park. We moved the late 1800s Brooks train depot to the site in 1989. The depot itself is our largest artifact.

We are now open at Powerland Heritage Park for the 2024 season. Our museum is open Saturdays, and on the big event days at Powerland. Email us for tours on other days. BHS6.OR@gmail.com

Our new agricultural exhibit is on Cane Berries, with lots of facts, fun facts, and old newspaper articles. We honor local persons who recently served in the military. Our current exhibit is on Joaquin Garcia, who served in the US Army as a Tank Maintenance Specialist from 2010-2013. Our exhibit on the Japanese Farmers of Lake Labish illustrates their story during WWII through the life of Roy Fukuda, who was a community leader, then interned at various camps as was his family, and later returned to the Brooks area. We also have exhibits on the evolution of the telephone, the “ghost town” of Parkersville, Pioneer Memorial Cemetery, and the communities of Brooks and Gervais. Come see us!

Our Annual Used Book Sale began as soon as we were sure the rains had (more or less) halted for the summer. Once again a tentful of used books at bargain prices of 50 cents or 25 cents will be offered all during the summer.

On May 18, 2024, we joined with the rest of Powerland Heritage Park to present S.T.E.A.M. ‘d Up for Kids. Our museum had kids make My 9-Patch, a glue and fabric craft reminiscent of old time quilting, and stamping vegetables to make pictures. Did you know cut onions make beautiful flower petal and leaf stamps?

Our featured agricultural exhibit this year is Cane Berries, with a video and information on the importance of Cane Berries to our area, particularly logan berries and Marion berries. The Brooks area had many loganberry growers and structures for berry drying in the early 1900s. The now very popular Marionberries were developed here in Marion County in the 1950s.

Our Depot Day on June 29, 2024  continued our cane berry celebration.

Free Admission for this event! The celebration included some berry themed games, such as berry toss (like corn hole) and pie pan disc golf. We also had berry themed contests with prizes:

• Best berry pie ! Bring your favorite homemade pie for our judges consideration.

• Pie eating! Eat your way to the bottom of a beautiful berry pie first, and win a prize!

See the pictures on the Brooks Historical Society FaceBook page.