Permanent Exhibits
Prehistoric Cedar Hill
The Cedar Hill Museum is proud to present the first of what, at build out, will be four phases of our history. Prehistoric Cedar Hill covers the period approximately 66 million years ago when the city lay under water, part of the Western Interior Seaway. The exhibit features ‘Plessy’, a long-necked Plesiosaurus, Cedar Hill’s earliest known resident discovered in the 1930s by T. J. Tidwell.
The fossilized specimen was one of a group of marine reptiles that swam right here in what was, around 220 million years to about 66 million years ago, an ocean. Come visit our museum inside the Traphene Hickman Library to learn more of Plessy’s remarkable story and discover the wonders of our City in a Park.
Early Settlement
Cedar Hill was officially established in 1846. Resilient families and single men were brought into the region throughout the 1840s through land settlement companies, such as the Peter’s Colony, to begin cultivating the region’s resources and provide opportunity for those courageous enough to brave the harsh realities of life in the West. Some traveled to Texas via covered wagons pulled by oxen, on horseback, and long, walking treks along rough trails. By this time, many colonists coming from other states in the U.S. made a good portion of the trip by steamboat too!