Old Lighthouse Museum Michigan City Historical Society

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Old Lighthouse Museum Michigan City Historical Society

The Old Lighthouse Museum is now open for its 53rd season! Visit us Wednesday–Sunday from 1 to 4 PM through October 31.
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Please send all mail to PO BOX 512, Michigan City, IN 46361-0512. We cannot accept mail at our Heisman address.

09/14/2026

NOTICE: Hometown Trivia Night, scheduled for Friday, September 18, has been cancelled.

The event was planned as a fundraiser benefiting both the Michigan City Historical Society and the Michigan City Zoological Society.

Anyone who paid online for the event will receive a full refund to their original payment method. Please allow up to 10 business days for the refund to appear in your account, depending on your bank or card issuer.

We apologize for the cancellation and any inconvenience this may cause. We may look at rescheduling Trivia Night for another date. If we do, we will share the new date and information once everything is confirmed.

Thank you to everyone who signed up, planned to attend, and volunteered to help with the event. We appreciate your understanding and your support of both organizations.

The Old Lighthouse Museum remains open through October 31, Wednesday through Sunday from 1–4 p.m. We hope you'll stop by and visit us before the season ends!

08/19/2026

Michigan City East Pierhead Lighthouse patches and T-shirts are available exclusively in the Old Lighthouse Museum gift shop!

Patches are now $8 each, and T-shirts are $22 each.

These are iron-on patches, but they can also be stitched onto jackets, backpacks, hats, or just about anything else you’d like. They measure a little over 2½ inches in diameter and feature a beautiful, high-quality image of the Michigan City East Pierhead Lighthouse.

We’re open today from 1–4 p.m.

There is no admission fee if you’d like to visit the gift shop only. Stop in and see us!

08/15/2026

The Old Lighthouse Museum will be closed today and tomorrow, Sunday, August 16. Many of our volunteers are still without power following the recent storms, and our sales system is currently down.

We will reopen as usual next week, starting Wednesday.

Thank you for your understanding, and we hope everyone affected by the storms is doing well.

07/28/2026

The Old Lighthouse Museum will be closed Saturday, August 1, and Sunday, August 2.

We will be open as usual this week, Wednesday through Friday from 1:00 to 4:00pm.

With the Great Lakes Grand Prix taking place this weekend, parking around the museum can be very limited. Rather than making it difficult for our volunteers and visitors to find parking, we have decided to close for the weekend.

If you're visiting Michigan City this week, there will be plenty to see and do, including all of the Great Lakes Grand Prix festivities!

07/21/2026

A brief Eastland Memorial ceremony will be held at Millennium Plaza in Michigan City on Saturday, July 25, at 10:00am to remember the 844 victims of the S.S. Eastland disaster.

On July 24, 1915, 111 years ago, the S.S. Eastland, a Great Lakes excursion ship, was bound for Michigan City, Indiana, from Chicago, Illinois.

Washington Park was preparing to welcome approximately 7,000 employees of Western Electric Company's Hawthorne Works, along with their families and friends, for a day of recreation.

With more than 2,500 passengers on board, the ship suddenly capsized while still tied to the dock in the Chicago River during boarding. Tragically, 844 people lost their lives. The victims were predominantly young women and children, and 22 entire families perished that fateful Saturday morning. The disaster remains the deadliest maritime tragedy in Great Lakes history.

The memorial anchor chain, located on the grounds of the Old Lighthouse Museum, is made up of 844 individual links, with each link representing one of the victims. Measuring 265 feet in length, the chain is the same length as the Eastland itself.

The S.S. Eastland Memorial was dedicated on July 25, 2015.

The Michigan City Historical Society and the Old Lighthouse Museum extend their sincere thanks to the Stimley family and the many volunteers whose time, dedication, and hard work made this memorial possible.

07/03/2026

🇺🇸 The Old Lighthouse Museum will be open on Friday, July 3, from 1 to 4pm.

The museum will be closed Saturday, July 4, and Sunday, July 5, so our volunteers can spend time with their families and friends celebrating America's 250th Birthday.

If you're visiting Washington Park this weekend, be sure to catch the Fourth of July fireworks, which will be launched from the Michigan City East Pier at dusk on Saturday evening.

The Old Lighthouse Museum makes a great foreground for fireworks photos, especially now that the building is illuminated in patriotic red, white, and blue!

If you take any photos, we'd love to see them. Share them with us in the comments!

🇺🇸 Have a safe and happy Fourth of July, everyone!

07/02/2026

"Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."
Leviticus 25:10, the inscription on the Liberty Bell

Join the churches of Michigan City, Indiana as we ring our bells at noon (CST) on the 4th of July, 2026 to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary!

Churches, Fire Stations, Town Halls, even the bells of the steam trains at LaPorte County’s Hesston Steam Museum will join in the celebration on that historic day.

We ask all who have a bell to ring it on Saturday, July 4th at noon (CST) for 2 ½ minutes as a tribute to 250 years of Liberty.

Let us know that you are with us, and we will post your name and logo on our website and page to thank you for your support. Please share this information on your social media sites; help us spread the word as we ask all to raise the sound of Liberty across our homeland.

Let's make northwest Indiana ring together as we celebrate America's 250th anniversary.

Happy Independence Day!

Please contact Bill Halliar, Co-President Michigan City Historical Society with questions or comments;

[email protected]

219-629-5853 cell

06/25/2026

We are proud to display this bench on the museum grounds in celebration of Michigan City's 190th anniversary.

The bench project, presented by the Michigan City Public Art Committee. It is one of 19 uniquely designed benches.

This particular bench was created by the LaPorte County Historical Society to honor Michigan City's 190th birthday. It features the names of many people, historic businesses and landmarks that have helped shape our community's history.

Artist - Tom Konieczny, board president La Porte County Historical Society

Address

100 Heisman Harbor Road
Michigan City, IN
46360

Telephone

(219) 872-6133

Website

https://www.mchistorical.org/

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