Officials of the Martinsville-Henry County Historical Society plan to fill the region’s heritage center with an eclectic collection of antiquities, once work on a new annex is complete.
Located at the back of the Martinsville-Henry County Heritage Center and Museum, the annex comes with a projected price tag of between $2 million and $4 million. Crews have been working on the project since last April, when the historical society held a groundbreaking to mark the start of the project. Work is expected to be completed toward the end of this year. Once completed, it will also provide an additional 13,000 square feet.
While parts of the annex will serve as storage, much of the facility will display items from the personal collection of Dr. Mervyn King, a retired doctor of anesthesiology and collector of unique artifacts.
“We want it to be set up correctly and properly,” King said, explaining that annex construction is scheduled for two more months with an additional six months scheduled for setting up the various planned displays. “We have all of these toys and displays, and it’s something I’d like to leave the community, and it’s something that will be beneficial to the community.”
King is the sole financial benefactor of the project. Many of the antiquities he hopes to fill the annex with line the walls of the home he shares with his wife, Virginia King, and their pet cat Petunia.
“Dr. King was hoping to share his immense collections of antiques with the community and tourists who would visit here,” said Holly Kozelsky, the historical society’s executive director. “He proposed having a large addition to the museum built. He would fund the construction of that annex if the historical society would take over its operation. … The historical society was thrilled and excited to plan to do so.”
The museum is currently home to a number of displays, including exhibits on the local history of Native Americans, early settlers, music, tobacco, and the textile and mining industries.
The annex will be filled with the items King has collected on his travels. King likened his collection and the manner of procurement to the popular show “American Pickers,” in which antiques are often found in random garages or storage units.
Each item tells a story, according to King, which makes them ideal to be featured in a museum. One of King’s display rooms is lined with antique weapons that range from the old to the difficult to find. His other display rooms feature an assortment of trinkets representing a piece of history both in and outside Henry County.
On a recent visit, King showed off perhaps the strangest antique in his collection: a vampire-killing kit that dates back to sometime in the late 1700s or early 1800s — complete with holy water and wooden crosses.
“They don’t like crosses,” he explained. “When you shot them you had to do it with silver bullets.”
Antique firearms and other unconventional weaponry accounts for perhaps the largest part of King’s collection.
“That back there is a large collection of defense canes,” King said, gesturing toward a collection of canes once used to carry smaller, more discreet weapons more than a century ago.
Another featured exhibit will be a gambling parlor. According to King, the gambling artifacts were found in different places along the Eastern coast of the country.
“No actual gambling, only displays,” King said.
Plans for other themed displays include Native American artifacts, among others. These displays will be set up on the first and second floors, while additional storage will be on the third floor.
The annex does not mark the first time the property has been expanded. When it originally served as a courthouse, the facility expanded several times. The property was deeded to the Historical Society in 2010 following a more than decade-long effort to save the building.
“If you look at the courthouse on the left-hand side, that was the original jailhouse,” King said, pointing to the hill behind the former courthouse.
Once completed, the portions of the annex housing displays will be open to the public. King and other members of the Historical Society encourage the public to take a visit.
King said that he hopes the annex will contribute to the museum’s status as an attraction.
“The more museums, the more we have things for people to see,” King said. “That’s what you want.”
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Correction 8:15 p.m. Feb. 28: Dr. Mervyn King is a retired doctor of anesthesiology. His specialty was incorrect in an earlier version of this story.
