The Life and Exciting Times of W.H.C. Folsom by Folsom House Museum Director Alyssa Auten

Alyssa Auten, the Director of the W.H.C. Folsom house museum in Taylor’s Falls, will
be presenting the life and exciting times of W.H.C. Folsom at the Washington County
Heritage Center, 1862 S. Greeley Street, Stillwater, on Wednesday July 15 th at 7pm.
Admission to this extraordinary presentation is free.
William Henry Carman Folsom (June 22, 1817 – December 17, 1900) was a businessman
and politician in Minnesota. Born in New Brunswick, Canada, he later immigrated to the
United States and settled in Maine. He moved west to Minnesota in the 1840s and settled
near Taylors Falls, Minnesota in 1850.
Folsom became involved in the lumber business in what would become the Minnesota
Territory and began investing in businesses and real estate in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
He was also an active historian and writer, publishing several articles and a book, Fifty
Years in the Northwest, which was published by the St. Paul Pioneer Press Company in
1888.
Folsom was also involved in state’s early political development, attending the Republican
constitutional convention in 1857 and serving four different terms in the Minnesota
House of Representatives and Minnesota State Senate between 1857 and 1877. He was
credited as helping organize the first district court in the state and was part of the
committee, which developed the first official Seal of Minnesota in 1858.
Folsom died in 1900. His home in Taylors Falls is now a museum owned by the
Minnesota Historical Society and operated by the Taylors Falls Historical Society.
For more information, contact the Washington County Heritage Center at 651-439-2298
or email at information@wchsmn.org.