Life breathed back into plan to turn post office into museum

By Gary Scott on May 24, 2016 at 6:28am

Old photo of post office from Morgan County Historical Society Facebook page.

A city committee is renewing efforts to turn the old Jacksonville post office into a museum.

The Jacksonville Heritage Cultural Board announced its intent to dust off a nearly decade-old project Monday night and also put out the call to have new members join the committee as it looks to raise funds for the project.

The old post office is owned by the Morgan County Historical Society.

Jacksonville Mayor Andy Ezard says renewed effort came about after an open house of the building several weeks ago on East State Street, sponsored by the Jacksonville Area Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Ezard says the cultural board hasn’t been very active over the last decade, and right now is focused on filling its vacancies.

“There’s artifacts all over this town that are being housed in a lot of different facilities of Jacksonville’s history. Eventually, they want them housed under one roof, and that’s the potential of the old post office to do that,” says Ezard.

“I think it’s a good endeavor. I think the City of Jacksonville will help out any way we can. But, they just want some new energy on the board, and this is a concern of theirs that they want to see it through.”

Ezard says the heritage cultural board will work with the county historical society to raise funds. He says this will require hundreds of thousands of dollars.