The Johnson County Museum will decorate its All-Electric House for the winter holiday season as it has in years past.
However, this year, the house will be decorated with items from the Jewish faith traditions, not aluminum Christmas trees and other 1950s Christmas decorations.
This new exhibit, called “Jewish Holidays in the All-Electric House,” is a partnership with the Michael Klein Collection at the Temple B’nai Jehudah, based in Overland Park.
It opens Friday, the first day of the week-long Jewish holy day of Sukkot, and runs through Jan. 6, 2024.
Representing Jewish Johnson County residents from the past
Andrew R Gustafson, the museum’s curator of interpretation, told the Post the new exhibit really highlights what Jewish holidays might have been like in a 1950s home in Johnson County.
“I think that representing diverse communities and diverse traditions within that space, within a home that a Jewish family in the 1950s might have owned, is within the strategic mission of the museum and better represents this community too,” Gustafson said.
He noted the sometimes forgotten history of Jewish families living in Johnson County, particularly in Prairie Village around the Meadowbrook Country Club. The club was one of just two in the Kansas City area that permitted Jewish families to be members.
“There was a community of Jewish families in Johnson County in the 50s in the 60s, and so it’s appropriate for the house,” said Curator of Collections Anne Jones.
The whole All-Electric House will be decked out for Jewish holidays
- In the front yard, there will be a sukkah, a temporary outdoor structure used for eating and sometimes sleeping during Sukkot.
- There will also be menorahs outside the home.
- Wooden children’s toys and puzzles depicting scenes from holiday celebrations will also be on display around the house, including a hand-carved chess set featuring people in the Torah.
- The dining room table will be set for Shabbat, or Sabbath. Display cases nearby will also feature a Kiddush cup, silver dishes and Challah bread.
- The living room will have driedles on display and another menorah.
- Additionally, a Ketubah — a written document used in a Jewish marriage ceremony — is on display in the bedroom, and the fridge is stocked with kosher foods.
The All-Electric House was built in 1954
Originally in the Prairie Village Indian Fields neighborhood, the home was built by the Kansas City Power and Light Company in the mid-1950s as a model home to show off “an electric future,” Gustafson said.
While it was a model home, thousands of people came to visit it.
Eventually, it became a true residence, with multiple families living in it over the years.
In 1994, the owners at the time approached the museum about taking ownership of the home.
“They reached out to the museum, cold call,” Jones said.
The family living there in 1994 had all of the original documentation from the model home, including the blueprints, correspondence with the builders and the utility company, information from the home’s original decorator, and event documentation from an electric appliance raffle hosted at the home.
“Because all the documentation was there, that’s really what kind of made it easy to make the decision,” Jones said.
The All-Electric Home was moved to the old Lackman library facility, sitting behind the building at the museum’s then-location at Lackman and 63rd in Shawnee. Later, crews moved it to the new Johnson County Museum space at the Arts & Heritage Center.
Gustafson said the house, which has been used for special exhibits before, serves as an interpretation of the life of a family living in 1950s Johnson County.
Looking back: Johnson County Museum uses All-Electric House for historic Passover celebration
