03-05-2025
She found shocking truth on McHenry family. Modesto museum aims to honor historian
Uniquely is a Modesto Bee series that covers the moments, landmarks and personalities that define what makes living in the Central Valley so special.
Modesto's McHenry Museum is looking to add space to honor a late historian whose biggest legacy may be discovering that the venue's famed namesake actually was an impostor.
But more on that impostor thing later.
The city of Modesto, which owns the museum, is raising funds for a Janet Lancaster History Center in the downtown historic building, according to Cultural Services Program Manager Jessica Flores, who runs the museum.
The history center would offer new services and programs for the community, Flores said in an email interview.
At this point, the addition is 'just an idea' that would need to be fully funded by community donations, she said. It's too soon in the process to know how much it would cost, but the effort already has received $8,500 in donations.
The hope is to create three connected areas for the Lancaster center, she said. Again, it's too early to tell how much of the around 17,000-square-foot museum's space it will occupy, Flores said. It won't cut into any of the exhibit areas.
The first area would be a research room on the museum's first floor to house reference books and the most requested research material.
A second area would be used for workshops and classes to help people with their own preservation projects, such as digitizing photo negatives or family history research.
The third would be a staff workspace.
Asked about construction, Flores said, 'Most of the space we need already exists. The idea is to create enough space to support research, provide education, and preserve the collection.'
There are thousands of items to view and use at the museum, she said.
'We began acquiring in the late 1960s, and by the mid-1970s there were already about 30,000 objects cataloged by hand. Staff are currently undertaking a collection assessment, and part of that is to digitally catalog everything. At the end, we'll have a searchable database, which will help us support the public with research efforts.'
The collection consists of 'a little bit of everything,' she said, including photos and documents, 'but we also have more obscure artifacts like hair jewelry and used Civil War bandages.'
Most of the museum's collection has come from community members.
Janet Lancaster was a Modesto native and teacher who started her career at El Vista School in 1957, according to David Seymour, executive director of the McHenry Museum and Historical Society.
She also was an avid historian. She volunteered at the museum for more than 20 years, organizing archives, photos and documents in the basement, Seymour said.
'Every Friday, you could find Janet Lancaster at the McHenry Museum,' he said. She didn't have a lot of space to work, which is part of the goal for the city's plan.
While Lancaster, who died in September 2024, was an 'extremely private person,' she did much for the community, Seymour said, including discovering that the famed Modesto McHenry family members weren't actually McHenrys.
According to a 2013 story in The Modesto Bee, 'everything McHenry in Modesto began when Robert McHenry arrived here sometime around 1850. That, McHenry Museum researcher Janet Lancaster ... discovered, includes the invention (or reinvention) of McHenry himself.'
Her project to learn more about his personal and family histories became a three-year investigation that ultimately changed some of what local historians believed for more than a century, according to The Bee story.
'Robert McHenry no doubt helped transform the Valley and build Modesto. But, Lancaster found, he wasn't the man folks thought he was back then,' the story said.
Born Robert Henry Brewster in Vermont in 1827, he was a direct descendant of Mayflower elder William Brewster, The Bee story recounted. 'He signed up for a five-year hitch as a rifleman in a newly formed Ohio Army regiment in 1846, told he'd be guarding forts along the Oregon Trail. But when the Army commandeered his regiment to fight in the Mexican-American War, he deserted.'
A few years later, Lancaster found that Brewster surfaced in Stockton as Robert McHenry, dropping Brewster and adding 'Mc' to his middle name, according to the story. 'Within a couple of years, he settled along the Stanislaus River, became one of Modesto's most influential citizens, and the rest is, well, history. Or legend.'
Seymour said Lancaster's work on Robert McHenry was her biggest legacy.
Perhaps that was meant to be.
'She actually grew up on McHenry Avenue. 'It's like her entire life (was) McHenry,' Seymour said.
Community money is needed for the Lancaster space, and an upcoming 'Historic 14th St. Walking Tour of Modesto' is among the fundraisers, Seymour said.
The tour is set for 4-7 p.m. Friday, May 30, and includes a look at the history of four former homes on 14th Street:
▪ The Hatton-Davis house at 909 14th, which is now home for Love Stanislaus
▪ The DeLappe house at 914 14th, now Provident Care
▪ The Elias-Haris house at 1015 14th, now Hawks and Associates
▪ And the Maddux-Morgan house at 1126 14th, now the Queen Bean.
Tickets for the tour are $25, available at the museum.
In addition, the Modesto Art Museum is offering a $5,000 matching contribution for the Lancaster center, according to Bob Barzan, treasurer and member of the group's board of directors.
The match comes with the dissolution of the Modesto Art Museum, Barzan said. It has been website-based with no building, but has done pop-up events in the city over the years.
The art museum is dissolving because it has not been able to attract new board members, according to Barzan.
'This (matching challenge) is part of our going away,' he said. 'We have a fair amount of money and have been giving it away to various nonprofits.'
Those who want to donate for the matching challenge can do so payable to McHenry Museum, with the memo 101479 JLancaster and sent to the McHenry Museum, Attention: Jessica Flores, PRN at P.O. Box 642, Modesto, CA 95353.
'We wanted to do something for the McHenry Museum and this seemed like a good way before we closed,' Barzan said.
The museum features history from across Stanislaus County, with each city having its own archive, Seymour said.
Admission to the museum is free.
According to its website, visitors will see a number of exhibits, such as gold mining artifacts, the founding of Modesto by railroad, irrigation development, agriculture and re-creations of a general store, a blacksmith shop, a one-room schoolhouse, a barbershop 'of days-gone-by,' a 1950s diner setting and more.
The museum also has temporary exhibits that change periodically.
There's a McMobile Museum that takes Stanislaus County history to various community events, as well as periodic historic CemeTours of local cemeteries. Both are programs of the museum's historical society. The next CemeTour will be on Memorial Day, May 26.
The Lancaster center would make the McHenry Museum's historical resources more available to the community, according to Flores.
'A lot of times people think that archives are 'off-limits,' or you need to be a serious scholar to access them, but really, we're here to serve as a resource to all who are interested in local history,' she said.
Lancaster 'worked extremely hard' to make the McHenry Museum the central place for local historical information, Flores said. '...We are continuing to build on her efforts to establish something she would be proud of.'
