A fire that was four miles high.  An orange sky could be seen from Iowa.  So many victims that they quit counting after 400 and buried bodies where they found them.  Stories of heroic train engineers and people whose lives were spared, as well as those who stayed to help others and did not survive themselves.

All of these are things you’ll learn about at the Hinckley Fire Museum in downtown Hinckley, Minnesota.

The fires of September 1894 came quickly, and there are many stories of survivors and victims housed in the museum, which is located in the depot that was built after the fires.  I had heard about the fires, but was shocked at the breadth of their destruction.  Newspaper articles on display from around the country, items that survived the fires even though their owners did not, and photos depicting the before and after of the firestorm bring to life the devastation caused by the fires.

The Hinckley Fire Museum doesn’t have a lot of hands-on activity for the kids, but mine enjoyed the diorama of the town of Hinckley, as well as the agent’s apartment on the upper level of the depot.  The story of the school that had opened just a year before it was destroyed in the fire also intrigued my kids.

The Hinckley Fire is an important part of Minnesota history, and I’m glad we had the chance to go there.

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