Joliet Area Historical Museum

The Museum continues to achieve and grow in local and international awareness. The Museum continues to encourage people of all ages to discover, understand and celebrate the Area's heritage and boundless future.

The old Joliet prison project involved the Museum taking day-to-day responsibility for tours at the former Illinois state penitentiary site after years of assessing feasibility and determining great public interest in the historic site. These tours have offered a new and vibrant revenue stream to underwrite organizational operations. The Museum has also committed to holding occassional special events to raise funds specifically to be used to secure and stabilize the property as to further monetize it. The Museum executed a memorandum of understanding with the city of Joliet, who acts as an unencumbered lessee at the site, owned by the state of Illinois, which outlines specific roles and responsibilies.