How the West Was . . . Once : Museums: Historical society exhibits artifacts dating from the city’s earliest days.

Touring the El Monte Historical Society Museum is like taking a stroll through an old Southern California town.

The majority of the museum’s exhibits feature artifacts dating from before the California Gold Rush up to the 1920s. Some items were donated by descendants of the early settlers of El Monte, once the major supply center for the entire San Gabriel Valley, curator Teresa Krist said.

The Spanish called the undeveloped swampland between the Rio Hondo and San Gabriel River monte --Spanish for “wooded spot.”

The museum’s exhibits date from the city’s earliest days. Pioneers who traveled to the Southland in wagon trains across the Santa Fe Trail from Kentucky founded the city of Lexington in 1851. It was renamed El Monte in 1866.

The collections are displayed in settings depicting a typical home, schoolhouse, general store and other shops, where women’s dresses, shoes, and crafts such as spinning and weaving are represented.

During a recent tour, Krist provided a brief history of a reproduction of Dobyns & Dodson General Merchandise--one of the city’s first general stores.

The makeshift shelves are stocked with foodstuffs such as nuts, rice, beans and corn, toiletries, and large chunks of soap made from lye and cow fat.

There is also a wooden checkerboard set up next to an old potbellied, wood-burning stove, where men and children “sat around and chewed the fat,” Krist said, while the women shopped. Back then, houses were scattered so far apart that people gathered at the store to socialize, she said.

Nearby is a barbershop, complete with chair and the traditional striped pole outside. Originally, the red, white and blue pole meant that medical assistance was also provided, Krist explained.

“It was something that spun around and caught the eye of people with emergencies riding through town,” she said.

Not only did the barber cut hair and give shaves, he also pulled teeth and removed bullets. A big slug of whiskey was usually the anesthetic.

On a wall in another room is a photo layout of the famous Gay’s Lion Farm, a local tourist spot for 20 years. European natives Charles and Muriel Gay, former circus stars, founded the farm in the early 1920s and raised more than 200 lions for the movie industry and circus acts.

“You could hear the lions roaring (for miles away), especially on Mondays when they didn’t feed them,” Krist said.

In the wild, lions do not eat every day, and the owners wanted to simulate the animals’ natural habitat, said Fred Love, museum caretaker and researcher. Mondays were rest days on the farm.

But the rationing of horse meat during World War II forced the farm to close, and the animals were donated to zoos.

A run-down 1911 Model-T touring car, bearing California license HC 4, is parked in the Frontier Room. The 80-year-old horseless carriage, built by Henry Ford, was loaned by Hoyt Curtis, whose brother bought it for $200 from a Chino farmer in the 1940s.

An American Indian display includes pottery, beads, moccasins, fossils, arrowheads, dolls and straw baskets. For cooking, Indians placed heated rocks in the baskets, which were woven tightly enough to hold water, Krist said.

Some glass cases contain loomed coverlets. One has the inscription “John Lafayette, Ohio, 1845.”

“The person who weaved them put their names and a date on them like an artist signs a picture,” Krist said.

Although the artifacts belong to the historical society, the city owns the building and provides maintenance. The city’s annual budget for the facility is $53,000.

Krist and Love are the only city-paid employees. In addition, 25 volunteers help run the museum at 3150 N. Tyler Ave.

The museum is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. Admission is free. Tours may be scheduled, by appointment only, on Saturdays and Sundays for 20 or more people.

Several new displays will be unveiled to the public during an afternoon tea today from 2 to 4.