About Atwood Museum
The Atwood Museum is operated by the Chatham Historical Society and is centered on the Atwood House, a dwelling built around 1752 for sea captain Joseph Atwood. The house remained in the Atwood family for generations and preserves an unusually tangible record of domestic life in an early Cape Cod community. Since the historical society acquired the property in the 1920s, the site has grown into a multi-gallery museum devoted to Chatham’s maritime, artistic, civic, and everyday history.
Visitors can tour period rooms in the historic house and explore galleries containing local furnishings, paintings, maps, maritime artifacts, photographs, and changing exhibitions. Notable features include objects connected with Chatham’s lighthouse and lifesaving traditions, the historic North Beach camp, and collections documenting the town’s development. The museum is worth visiting for its combination of an authentic eighteenth-century home and a broad, community-focused account of life on the outer Cape.
