JC Penney Home & Museum
By: Sarah Reish
We walked a block from the original store James Cash Penney opened and checked out his home. This quaint home exudes Americana with an adorable yard, white picket fence, cobblestone walkway, and stunning porch with intricate detailing. This museum is free, but accepts donations. Our tour guide was a young local full of information and details and we truly enjoyed having her as our guide.
The Home and The Details
Some fun details we learned include JC Penney’s actual name, James Cash Penney, that he and his wife built their back porch with packing crates from the store, he has a super secret hidden floorboard where he hid his cash, and so much more. The home and museum are now filled with period furnishings and decor, with only a couple of original items. The tube from the pulley system used for paying tabs at his store is in this museum and the dining room is set with donated silverware that was sold in his stores during the early years. Engraved on the back of the silver spoon is his name! The home had one bedroom downstairs with a second room upstairs.
The Back Porch
It’s a steep step, but the back porch is quite a decent size considering it was made with packing crates. James Cash Penney and his wife, Bertha Alva Hess built it together. It has since been updated, but the restoration included keeping several of the original packing crate boards with the shipping stamps still visible. This helps to visualize what it may have looked like when it was originally built.
The Upstairs and The Tunnels
The steps are very narrow, but upstairs is the bedroom setup (the bedroom downstairs is used for glass cases containing some original and historic pieces). Period wallpaper, bedding and more, decorate the upstairs bedroom area. The upper floor features a slanted ceiling, meaning to walk upright one would need to be in the center and would have to duck along the sides of the room. This architectural feature makes Penney’s hiding spot for his cash all the more harder to find. Tucked close to the chimney along the wall is a small piece of flooring that pops out and offers the perfect amount of space for hiding ones hard earned money. Our tour guide shared that her mom was a realtor and many of the homes have tunnel access to the tunnels around town. Back in the early 1900’s the town had a major bootlegging problem. We found this highly interesting. Apparently, whenever the mobsters from the big city’s needed to hide out or their men needed to lay low they would come out west to continue to work until whatever problem blew over. Thus Kemmerer, Wyoming is steeped in the mobster and bootlegging history.
The Person and the Family
While the home/museum is small we learned so much about the area, the JC Penney stores, and James Cash Penney and his family. Unfortunately Penney’s wife died of pneumonia in 1910 and left him with his two sons. He did not remarry for almost ten years. Unfortunately, his next wife, Mary Hortense Kimball passed away after only four years of marriage after giving birth to a son and facing medical issues. In 1926 Penney married his third wife, Caroline Marie Autenrieth (b. 1895, d. 1992) and they had two daughters. The day after Christmas in 1970 Penney broke his hip in a fall. A few weeks later he suffered a severe heart attack and passed away February 12, 1971. He lived an extraordinary life and kept his stores afloat during the Great Depression and stayed involved until his passing.
Hit the Road!
This is a must see for those who love American history and seeing a historical glimpse of people who left a big impression during their lifetime. Please share your visit on social media and tag us @LiveWYldMag and use #LiveWYld