Lebanon’s Harmon Museum Showcases Ohio History

Lebanon practically oozes history. The Warren County seat was founded before Ohio became a state, is home to the Golden Lamb (Ohio’s oldest continuously operated business) and neighbored an important but long-gone Shaker settlement called Union Village. With that venerable heritage, you’d expect Lebanon to have an impressive museum, and it does.

The Harmon Museum sits in the heart of town and boasts three time-honored buildings that offer far more than slices of local history.  They deliver a veritable smorgasbord of southwest Ohio culture through eclectic exhibits that showcase a rich and appealing array of regional treasures. Most of the exhibits are located in Harmon Hall, a stately Greek Revival structure that real estate tycoon William Elmer Harmon gave to his hometown.

“It was built in 1913 as a state-of-the-art recreation center and had a basketball court, a Turkish sauna, a weight room and even a bowling alley,” says executive director Michael Coyan. “The museum transformed the basketball court into a 19th-century Village Green complete with a post office, daguerreotype studio and general store where visitors can play checkers.”

Adjoining Harmon Hall is the Armstrong Conference Center, a 1936 post office that now contains the Armstrong Gallery of Flight. Astronaut Neil Armstrong famously walked on the moon in 1969, and the gallery features memorabilia highlighting his down-to-earth lifestyle after he left NASA and lived on a farm outside Lebanon.

The museum’s must-see exhibit is in The Robert & Virginia Jones Shaker Gallery, named for the couple who bought the Golden Lamb in the 1920s and furnished it with pieces from Union Village’s abandoned buildings. The museum is renowned for its trove of Shaker items (many of which were donated by descendants of the Joneses family) and inventions like the flat broom and apple peeler.

“Our Shaker collection is the largest west of the Alleghenies and probably one of the finest in the world,” Coyan says.

105 S. Broadway, Lebanon 45036, 513/932-1817, wchsmuseum.org/harmonmuseum

For more Ohio travel inspiration, sign up for our Ohio Magazine newsletters. 

Ohio Magazine is available in a beautifully designed print issue that is published 7 times a year, along with Spring-Summer and Fall-Winter editions of LongWeekends magazine. Subscribe to Ohio Magazine and stay connected to beauty, adventure and fun across our state.