Hay Lake School and Erickson Log House Museum

Hay Lake School and Erickson Log House museums

The Hay Lake School was constructed in 1896. This was rural school district #2 and that district was organized in Washington County in 1855. After several years of school being held in local homes, the school was moved into the old Elim Lutheran Church building. The school used that structure, which is now a part of the Gammelgarden complex, until this brick school building was built.

Hay Lake School was used by Washington County Rural School system until 1963. The building then sat empty and boarded up until 1970 when a group of citizens, many of who graduated from the Hay Lake School, decided to clean the school and start giving tours of the building.

The school was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on July 1, 1970. In 1974 the Washington County Historical Society took over the schoolhouse and in 1978 the Society purchased the school from the Forest Lake School District.

The log house was constructed in 1868 by Johannes Erickson and his thirteen year old son Alfred. There were many good times and bad times for the immigrant Erickson family in the log home. In 1904, Alfred constructed a nicer home and the old log home became at various time a granary, garage and playhouse.

In 1974, the Washington County Historical Society purchased the old log house and moved it one and a half miles to its present site. The Erickson Log House was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 17, 1976.