Stuhr’s 1890s Railroad Town is the thing: a complete prairie town you walk through, with costumed interpreters working the blacksmith shop, the mercantile, the depot, the schoolhouse. It’s living history done right — hands-on, unhurried, and genuinely educational rather than theme-park.
The anchor is the Stuhr Building itself, a modernist landmark designed by Edward Durell Stone (of Kennedy Center fame) with twin spiral staircases and marble floors that make it worth visiting on architecture alone. The grounds hold 200 acres: a log cabin settlement from the 1850s, farm machinery and antique autos, and miles of trails.
Open year-round, with longer summer hours. The Christmas season’s “Christmas Past & Present” event is a regional tradition. Good Housekeeping once named it one of the top ten places to relive America’s past, and for once the magazine blurb undersells it.