The Ice Cream Parlor at Chippewa Valley Museum

The ice cream parlor is open for business from 1-5 pm any day the museum is open, and for those visiting the parlor only, the museum admission fee is waived. Besides being a favorite final stop on a museum visit, the parlor is a popular place for birthday parties and similar events. For information about reserving the parlor, call Angela Allred at (715) 834-7871, or email a.allred@cvmuseum.com.

The ice cream parlor is sponsored by Walter and Marny Tibbitts in memory of Jean Tibbitts. 

From 1912 to 1922, the museum’s marble soda fountain was used at Dor Smith’s, an ice cream parlor and tobacco shop, located at 124 S Barstow St, Eau Claire.
In 1922, Alfred Bjerke bought it and moved it to his drug store in Fall Creek.

Bjerke’s timing was impeccable. Ice cream parlors flourished during Prohibition as socially acceptable gathering places. The Bjerke family used the fountain for the next half-century and donated it to the Chippewa Valley Museum in 1977.