Women are often lost in history. An 1870s wedding photo of Mr. and Mrs. John Doe gives us no clue of who Mrs. Doe was, not even a first name. A woman’s business could be recorded under her husband’s name, leaving no trace of her endeavors. The vast majority of women in the later 1800s remained in their homes working as wives and mothers, but it is these women, the housewife, the farm wife, who carved Chaska out of a forest, creating family life, schooling, and culture, one home at a time.

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​The Chaska History Center has built an exhibit to honor all the historic women of Chaska. There are those who had a major impact on the town, such as the woman whose determination brought about Chaska’s first library, the lady who saw a need to keep Chaska seniors in town, in comfortable, affordable housing, and a woman who brought a major highway brushing past Chaska, ensuring commercial growth.

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The exhibit should be a feast for the eyes. We want  21st-century folks to understand the harsh physical labor a housewife endured, and all the inventive contraptions that were used in laundry, cooking, and cleaning. The designing women of Chaska’s history have left behind beautiful quilts, shawls, paintings, and thread work. We record the budding businesswomen and politicians of the early 20th century and their more successful sisters of the later 20th century. Oh, and the clothes they wore! Dresses from different decades, the high-laced shoes, the mandatory hats and gloves that a respectable woman always wore before stepping outside.

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The women’s exhibit is still a work in progress. We still have more ideas and plan to share even more stories of Chaska's amazing women over the next two years. Please visit.  Let us honor the unsung females of Chaska’s history.

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Julie Wiese