Connecticut's statewide history museum (founded 1825, rebranded 2023) whose 'CHS Gets Creepy' behind-the-scenes tour brings out a 1870s walnut-and-horsehair corpse preserver, death portraits, and other macabre artifacts.
1 Elizabeth Street, Hartford, CT 06105
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Standard museum admission charged; the 'CHS Gets Creepy' behind-the-scenes tour is a separate ticketed program recommended for ages 12 and up.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Paved entry and accessible galleries; storage-area tours involve some uneven surfaces.
Equipment
No Photos
Est. 1825 · Founded 1825 — one of the oldest historical societies in the U.S. · Connecticut's official state historical society · Rebranded 2023 from Connecticut Historical Society · Holds rare 1870s corpse preserver artifact · 270,000+ artifacts, 100,000+ books and pamphlets
The Connecticut Historical Society was established in 1825 by a group of prominent citizens including the clergyman-historian Thomas Robbins and the painter John Trumbull. It was created to 'collect objects important to the history of Connecticut, and the United States more generally,' and ranks among the oldest historical societies in the United States. From its founding the society has functioned as the state's central historical collecting body, accumulating manuscript collections, fine and decorative arts, and material-culture objects from across Connecticut.
The society's current building at 1 Elizabeth Street, west of downtown Hartford near Elizabeth Park, houses a museum, library, archive, and education center open to the public. The collections include more than 270,000 artifacts and graphics and over 100,000 books and pamphlets, and the institution holds one of the largest costume and textile collections in New England.
In 2023 the institution undertook a major rebrand and updated its name from the Connecticut Historical Society to the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History, with the goal of more clearly communicating its public-museum mission alongside its archival and scholarly functions. Director Rob Kret oversees the institution.
Among the museum's most-publicized artifacts is a late-1870s 'corpse preserver' constructed of walnut, iron, horsehair insulation, and glass. The preserver was designed to nestle a body below a thick layer of ice — slowing decomposition during multi-day Catholic-immigrant wake practices that arrived in Connecticut in the later 19th century — while allowing mourners to view the face of the deceased through a small glazed window. Two ports at the foot end drained melting ice water into buckets. The artifact was 3D-modeled in a 2022 partnership with the University of Connecticut, and Andrea Rapacz, the society's director of collections, has spoken publicly about it. Few corpse preservers of this type remain intact in U.S. collections.
Sources
According to the Connecticut League of History Organizations' 'Haunted History' program listing and Real Hartford's 'Meet Your City: Creepy Hartford' coverage, the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History runs a behind-the-scenes tour each fall titled 'CHS Gets Creepy.' The tour grants visitors access to storage and collection areas not normally open to the public, with a curatorial focus on macabre objects from the institution's holdings.
The most-discussed object on the tour is the late-1870s corpse preserver — a walnut casket-like enclosure insulated with horsehair, holding the body below a thick bed of ice with a small glass window for mourners to view the deceased's face. The preserver is one of few intact examples surviving in U.S. collections and was developed at a time when Catholic immigrant wake customs were arriving in Connecticut. According to the Connecticut Historical Society's own collection blog and the UConn Today coverage of the 2022 3D-modeling partnership, the artifact is genuine and well-documented.
Additional macabre material highlighted on the tour includes 19th-century death portraits (photographs of recently deceased loved ones, a Victorian mourning convention), and vampire-folklore material from Connecticut's New England vampire panic period of the 1800s. The museum's storage vaults are flagged in Real Hartford's local-history coverage as among the city's most atmospherically macabre spaces.
We have not surfaced documented apparition or resident-spirit reports inside the museum itself; the paranormal angle here is curatorial — the collection holds death-culture artifacts of genuine historical interest — rather than haunted-building lore.
Media Appearances
Tour Connecticut's state historical society galleries, which interpret 400 years of Connecticut history through more than 270,000 artifacts and 100,000 books and pamphlets, including one of New England's largest costume and textile collections.
Seasonal one-hour behind-the-scenes tour of storage and collection areas not normally open to the public, focused on macabre artifacts — including the late-1870s corpse preserver, death portraits, vampire-related material, and mourning-culture objects. Recommended ages 12+.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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