ST. MARY PARISH — For many, Berwick’s lighthouse is the face of the town.
But within the Brown House Berwick’s Heritage Museum, the walls take you on a walk throughout the history of the oldest established settlement in St. Mary Parish.
And now, your family’s legacy can last forever within the museum.
The museum was donated by Dewey Brown and began to fill with artifacts donated by citizens of Berwick.
"The oldest artifact here, hmm... that's a good question,” said Mayor Pro Tim Lud Henry, who serves as a member of the Berwick Historical Society.
“Probably that pirogue is probably cause that was a Native American pirogue.”
Four rooms feature current exhibitions: Berwick Live Oak Society Collection, Early History of Berwick, The Orphan Train Movement, Atchafalaya Bay Lighthouses, Hall of Valor and Historic Homes and Businesses.
There is also a hallway dedicated to those who served in all branches of armed services, going all the way back to 1812.
The latest project, being orchestrated by Museum Curator Shannon Hubbard McFate, is creating a digitized archive of records on the town's website.
Henry said for the past month they have been piecing history together.
"A lot of old artifacts, pictures, legal documents, from way back when as late as the late 1700s,” Henry said.
“Land grants, just anything that had legal aspects to owning a piece of land or something. Marriage license, things like that."
He said they are always looking for new artifacts to add to the digitized archive.
“Recently, we've gotten some old journals from somebody's great-grandparents that lived here long, long time ago,” Henry said.
“So, if any Berwick residents that have any of those kind of old artifacts we'd love to be able to access them and digitize them so that we maybe could put it online on our town website."
He hopes through digitized records, Berwick natives can connect to their ancestors.
"Most people that were born and raised here even if they're young at this point, if they come here and visit, or they go online they'll have some kind of connection to an old family member, or cousin, or something that they can tie the history of Berwick to their life now.” Henry said.
Henry said city funding will allow them to expand the museum.
