Museums

Preserving much of the history of the Lake area are three museums (Camden County, Miller County and Morgan County museums) and historic Willmore Lodge. Each with its own collection of exhibits and artifacts of a time long before Bagnell Dam was built.

You can also visit an interactive science museum, The Orion Center located in Camdenton.

Camden County Museum

The Camden County Museum in Linn creek is housed in what was once the Linn Creek School located on V Road just off US Hwy 54. Each classroom has been devoted to a specific theme, ranging from archives to a weaving room, where woven rugs can actually be purchased. Other exhibits include antique household furnishings, tools (including a commercial forge), banking equipment, and a community service room featuring facilities from former schools, doctors, dentists and churches in the area.

Open April through October, Monday through Friday, 10:00am to 4:00pm. Limited hours Nov thru March, Call 573-346-7191 for details and Saturday Special Events. Linn Creek, MO 65052.

Miller County Museum

The Miller County Museum in Tuscumbia can be found in the old Anchor Mill building, located on West Hwy 52. The building and the museum serve as a monument for the proud culture of the Miller County people. As a folk life museum, it provides an authentic vision of central Missouri society, its Indian heritage, early home accessories, machines, crafts, schools, churches and agriculture.

Open Mid-May through Mid-September, Mon,Wed and Fri, 10:00am to 4:00pm. 573-793-6998: Special Tours Available. Tuscumbia, MO 65082

Morgan County Museum

The Morgan County Historical Museum is located in the Martin Hotel on 120 N Monroe in Versailles, which has been a landmark in that community for more than 165 years. Twenty-eight rooms of the hotel, founded in 1853, are uniquely decorated in different themes, including a chapel room, weaving room, barbershop room, schoolroom and the Miss Lucy room, in honor of the last surviving member of the Martin family. In the lobby remains the eight-day Seth Thomas wall clock and the keyboard with keys behind the original hotel desk.

Open to the public year round, Tuesday through Friday, 12:00pm to 5:00pm and Saturdays, 9:00am to 12:00pm. Special arrangements can be made for group tours at other times by calling 573-378-5530. Versailles, MO 65084

Willmore Lodge

Located just northeast of Bagnell Dam on Business Hwy. 54, this historic log building was completed in 1930 by the Union Electric Company, (now AmerenUE). It served as an administrative and entertainment center for the mammoth Bagnell Dam construction project, an endeavor of such magnitude that it destroyed or displaced five towns, created a man-made lake with a shoreline rivaling Lake Michigan's in length, and created a new tourism economy in central Missouri that thrives to this day. The building is now refurbished and serving the Lake area and its visitors as a museum, cultural activities center, and offices of the Lake Area Chamber of Commerce.

Lake Area Chamber Visitor Center & Museum Open all year: 573-964-1008 or 800-451-4117 1 Willmore Lane, Lake Ozark, MO 65049

Orion Center

Orion Science Center is the fun learning place for kids and adults at Lake of the Ozarks . Whether you like rockets or dinosaur fossils...indoor museum or outdoor activities - it's the place for you. Indoor attractions include space exhibits from the St. Louis Science Center , the Clifford Wilson Archaeology Collection, the Bone Room featuring a life-size cast of the head of Stan the T-Rex, the Paleo Lab fossil casting room and more.  Then go on an adventure to the land of the dinosaurs in our DinoSpace Adventure Fun Park where civilized technology confronts the dinosaurs.  Walk an Ozarks nature trail while you build and launch a paper rocket, shoot a Tyrannosaurus with a trebuchet, fight off giant beasts with the water balloon Slingasaurus and climb into a tree on the liftasaurus.  Great family fun.

Orion Center is on Highway 5 about a mile south of the Hwy 54 intersection in Camdenton , Missouri .  Call for hours at (573)346-5516 or check out our web site at www.orioncenter.org .