The Woodman Institute Museum is three buildings for the price of one, and each has a distinct character. The Woodman House holds the core natural history and Civil War collections: mineral specimens, stuffed animals in cases, military equipment, and period furnishings accumulated by a man who simply could not stop collecting. The building has changed little since it passed to the city over a century ago, and you feel the weight of that accumulation in every room.
The Dame Garrison House, moved to the museum grounds, is the most historically significant structure. Built around 1675 during the period of intense conflict between English settlers and the Penacook people, it represents the kind of fortified domestic architecture that shaped early New England life in ways that are easy to forget when looking at the region's tidier colonial-era buildings. The third building, the Hale House, contains the art and decorative arts collections. Together, the three give you a fuller picture of Dover's history than any single exhibit could.