Pleasant Hill Historical Gets $50K Grant

The Pleasant Hill Historical Society received just under $50,000 in state grant money Wednesday to maintain the Pioneer Hall Museum.

President Jim Blalock said the grant comes from the the Tennessee State Museum and will pay for exterior improvements. Blalock said it is important to protect the museum because it provides an important educational opportunity to those in the town.

“One of the biggest things I believe it helps is our elementary students who don’t have to read it out of a book,” Blalock said. “They can actually come over there and see items that were made, see exactly how everything would work.”

Blalock said said they will use the funds to replace rotting wood, refinish old caulking, and repair the museum’s gutter system. Blalock said the Pioneer Hall Museum was originally the second building of a boarding school and was built in 1887.

Blalock said they are required to have all of the work finished by June 1, 2025.

“There’s four or five pages that we have to fill out to make sure that we’ll legally do it,” Blalock said. “We have to have that in by November the 15 and the 15 then is when they will award us the money.”

Blalock said once the projects are complete they will have to turn in a final report showing the museum before and after the work was completed.

Blalock said the museum is also important for its role as a memorial to Dr. May Wharton, a woman who started a two-bed hospital in the town called Uplands in the early 1900s.

“(In) ’49 and ’50 they moved the hospital to Crossville which became Cumberland Medical Center,” Blalock said. “Presently Cumberland Medical Center which has been there seventy-four years. She actually helped get that started. She was on the board.”