Online Collection
Cohasset Historical Digital Collections
Cohasset Historical Society has over 30,000 individual objects accessioned into our collection, including artwork, thousands of photographs, documents, maps, and a significant textile collection. Today’s museums are faced with finding solutions to these main issues: protecting and preserving artifacts, especially documents; space for housing and displaying the collection; and how to stay relevant to the communities we serve.
As a part of a multi-year project to digitize our holdings, we have launched our publicly searchable online collection. Here, you can explore a selection of our vast collection and discover Cohasset’s rich history through these interesting objects.
Check back regularly as we continue to add to the database. Click here to access our digitized collection!
Questions about any of the objects in our database? Fill out this form and a staff member will get back to you as soon as possible.
Collection Spotlight
Historic Costume and Textile Collection
Located in the Pratt Building, the Society’s Historic Costume and Textile Collection is a notable collection of traditional and artistic pieces dating from the 1700s to today.
The collection includes a number of ladies’ gowns, men’s suits, fans, shoes, hats, and even quilts of Cohasset residents of bygone times.
The Society began collecting textiles and historic dress in the 1960s. Now a collection of over 4,000 items, the Society continues to actively add garments of local importance.
Helen Howes Vosoff Theater Archive
Comprising nearly 2,000 photographs, paper ephemera, posters, and props, the Helen Howes Vosoff Theater Archive spans nearly 100 years of theater history in Cohasset, including the South Shore Players, the Cohasset Dramatic Club, and the South Shore Music Circus.
Coming Soon…
Maritime Collection
credit: James Wirth Photography
The Society’s collection of maritime-related objects and archival material documents Cohasset’s seafaring history beginning with the earliest Indigenous People and continuing through the age of sail in the 19th century with shipbuilding, the fishing industry and trading voyages, and ending with today’s recreational boating. This collection is housed in the Society’s recently reinstalled and reinterpreted Maritime Museum.
Fine Art Collection
A collection of over 100 paintings featuring scenes of Cohasset and notable persons, with works by well-known artists such as MacIvor Reddie and Frank W. Shapleigh.