Fannin County, Texas -- It can be easy to forget how simple some aspects of modern life have become. For example, while we can just run into the nearest grocery store and buy a tub of butter to bring home, the practice of churning your own butter was a staple in most households all the way into the middle of the twentieth century. From the 1700s through the 1940s, butter churns were produced and sold for household use in a variety of different sizes and styles.
One of the most commonly used churns was the plunge or dash churn. This churn uses a wooden plunger or dasher in a constant up and down motion to agitate the cream and produce butter. Another popular churn was the paddle churn which was spun or rocked back and forth to agitate the cream. Some households even had a barrel churn, which does not have the paddles but rotates the barrel to produce the butter.
Once the butter was completed, it was pressed into wooden molds with carved patterns to give it a more decorative look.
At the Fannin County Museum of History, you can get a close up look at each of these different butter churns, molds and other dairy equipment while also learning more about the process it took to make butter for the household.
The Fannin County Museum of History is located in the old train depot just a few blocks south of the Courthouse Square in Bonham. The Museum is open Tuesday - Saturday, noon - 4:00 p.m.
