The Kalona Historical Village has had a very different year to say the least, due to COVID-19 and having everything we do to raise money canceled. Thanks to the support of the community, things have gone a lot better than we originally thought.

The good news is that with us being closed for several months, everything in the visitor’s center got changed — everything was moved around, and new exhibits erected.

The Village has hundreds of pieces of glassware and during the COVID shutdown, thanks to the efforts of Greg Boyd and Martha Ann Crawford, all of the glass was categorized into cases, such as novelties, Roman Rosette, pattern glass, misc. clear, clear, color, strained, clear opalescent, Iowa City glass and Vaseline Glass, which gets its color from uranium.

The Village’s Rock and Gem room features the Holy City, a work of art depicting scenes from Revelations in the Bible. It contains 12 gemstones, including a 35-carat emerald and nine ounces of gold. A new brochure was made up by Kris Lyle that covers the project in detail.

The Rock and Gen room also boasts a display of Millerite mineral specimen which is very rare and only found in a few places in the world. Two of those places are within 50 miles of Kalona: Ollie, and Coralville, Iowa.

Fifty years ago, when my brother Doug and my father Logan Reif were hunting for rocks in the River Products Quarry in Coralville, Doug found the best millerite on calcite with chalcopyrite specimen in the world. A picture of this specimen is on display in the room. To think, this was 20 miles from Kalona!

A very special day for people to tour the village is when Grace Tully is at work in the loom house. In the past year, under her direction, all the spinning wheels and looms have been repaired. All are in working order and are used on a regular basis. Visitors are thrilled to watch her at work and to be able to carry on a conversation and ask questions. She does it all — she spins, weaves, sews and knits. The only thing she doesn’t do is raise the fibers she uses.

The Village also has one of the largest public displays of spool cabinets in the country. Spool cabinets hold thread that women purchased in stores. Spool cabinets were given to these merchants free with a purchase of product from 1885 to 1915. The cabinets on display are 100 to 120 years old.

One of the cabinets on display is one you will never see again in your lifetime — only about half a dozen or less still exist in the world. Patented in 1900, it works like a vending machine; a nickel is dropped in the coil slot, a handle is pulled and a spool of thread drops out. It was purchased at one of Rich Penn’s general store sales held in Des Moines and was listed in the sale as perhaps the only one known to exist.

The Amish quilt gallery got the biggest makeover during the winter shutdown and all of the displays were changed around and all new signage was made up that covers a lot more information about the Amish, their schools and their history in the Kalona area.

The Village has more than 800 hand-sewn quilts in the collection and 220 of those are Amish quilts. New displays are set up every six months, so that when you come back to visit, you will always see something new.

The Village has one of the better Amish quilt collections in the country. New in the room is a video that features local and nationally known quilt expert Sarah Miller and she talks about herself, her quilt shop and quilting in general. New on display is a cooling bed which was used at funerals around 1900 to keep the body before embalming was used.

The Kalona Historical Village has a lot of repeat-value; even if you’ve come before, there is always something new to see. Especially with all the rearranging and changes made during the COVID shutdown, the Village offers new experiences whenever someone walks through the door.