Tongass Historical Museum - Ketchikan, Alaska

VDms_

Excellent exhibits and beautiful view of the creek!

The museum is affordable (under $10) and free for military! Be sure to donate.

The displays are informative, well kept, and specifically mention some of the more unsavory parts of history which is often overlooked or intentionally ignored for the glorification of colonialism.

Highly recommend.

margexplore

IT WAS TERRIBLE! My mom who is in her 60s really needed to use the restroom. The woman working at the front desk refused to let her go to the bathroom because they were cleaning it. I would understand if the bathroom was being repaired or there was a plumbing issue. But the fact that it was just being cleaned and she really had to go and the front desk woman wouldn't let her is just ridiculous!

She is also in her 60s so it's not like she can run to the nearest bathroom in a restaurant or cafe. If I could give this place zero or negative stars I would. It just about decent human compassion and giving a person some dignity. It honestly really soured the whole experience in Ketchikan.

I understand when staff don't like rude tourists or even tourists over taking their town. But my mother wasn't rude and even begged because it was an emergency. I want to save my mom some dignity but to put it mildly it was a humiliating experience for her to walk back to the boat to clean herself up.

Please train your staff properly and allow an elderly woman some dignity the next time she asks to go to the restroom even if it's being cleaned. It literally only takes an additional 10 minutes of patience. Nothing more.

Diane L.

We took a 20mins walk from Totem Historic museum to here. You can also wait for the free shuttle outside the museum to come over here.
A small little compact museum, but all exhibits give you a true sense of the history, culture, and enduring strength and spirit of the people of this salmon city-Ketchikan.
It’s provide information about the past Like mining, fishing, cannery, totem poles, Tlingit people and new exhibits are about the new local life.
Good to spend 1-2hours reading through the information of course it will be great if tour guide are there to explain more lively information.
The reception young staff is patient and explained how we should go round visiting museum. There is a free shuttle bus stop right outside the museum which gave us much convenient during the rainy day.

doug D.

Ketchikan has a lot of history and you can see it's beautiful history here

Darren M. H.

Didn't arrive till 4.30 and it closed at 5 so very kind staff didn't charge us anything.
Really well set out.
Extremely interesting.
Many thanks for allowing us the chance to visit

Michelle F.

The Tongass Historical Museum really provides you with a holistic view of the area and rich history. From the beginning with fossils to mining, oil, cannery (fish), logging, pulp mills, totem poles and the Tlingit people!

There are 1,000’s of artifacts and pieces in their collection to see. They don’t charge very much ($6) to go thru and see all the fascinating nuggets of history!

Sky S.

Amazing place to go if you have time to kill and you love learning. Tickets only cost $6 for adults, $5 for elders, and anyone 17 and younger gets free entry. They have two exibits, the main one being Ketchikan history (including fishing, lumbering, and a little bit of mining history), and they also have a smaller dinosaur exhibit. They have a lot of items on display and I found it all very fascinating. They even recreated the framework for one lengend of that area, fit with it's real skull. I was there for over an hour and didn't even read every sign they had. Highly recommend, especially if you love museums like I do!

Desiree D.

Went on a stop with my cruise port. Very nice people who work there. Small place but it want expensive at all so it worth the amount. I was able to learn some interesting things about the town history.