Hugh Cargill’s dishes, china, 1725‱740, porcelain, gift of Dora A. and Emily Proctor, 1947, gift of Ina Clark, 1935. These dishes belonged to Hugh Cargill (1739‱799), who came to New England from Ireland in 1774. He prospered as a dealer in West India (Caribbean) goods and bequeathed to the town of Concord a farm for the poor. Today, Cargill is memorialized in Concord by a street named for him and by the Hugh Cargill Community Gardens and Hugh Cargill Trust, which provides emergency financial aid to residents in need. ⁄avid Bohl photo

The Concord Museum will celebrate the 375th anniversary of the founding of the town of Concord with a special exhibition featuring objects that have been passed down in Concord’s families and then entrusted to the Concord Museum. “Into Your Hands&• opens Friday, April 16, and runs through Sunday, September 19.

On Saturday, April 17, at 2 pm, Concord Museum curator David Wood will lead a gallery talk, “History Handed On,” providing an in-depth look at some of the many intriguing objects in the exhibition. Reservations are requested for the talk, which is free with museum admission; members free.

These extraordinary objects †spanning 12 generations †come with fascinating stories that tell much about the town and those who have lived and worked here: famous residents and ordinary citizens, ministers and mothers, journalists and farmers, school girls and teachers, war heroes and literary icons. Some of the objects commemorate a personal event such as a wedding or the birth of a child; some, a nationally important event like the opening battle of the American Revolution. In many cases, the objects have never traveled further than a mile from where they were made; others have traveled far and wide, finally coming home to Concord.

The exhibition includes portraits, jewelry, needlework, ceramics, clothing, furniture, clocks and silver, all donated to the Concord Museum by family members with the intent to preserve Concord’s history for generations to come. The title “Into Your Hands&• is taken from a 1942 letter written by Lucy Merriam Brigham describing her gift of family possessions to the museum.

Amos Barrett’s powder horn, Concord area, about 1775, cow horn, pine, gift of Frederick S. Richardson, Peter H. Richardson and Joan R. Fay. The owner of this horn, Amos Barrett (1752‱829), was at the North Bridge in Concord on April 19, 1775, and vividly recalled 50 years later what he saw and did that day. He saw the musket balls splash in the river, heard them whistle by his ears and saw Abner Hosmer and Isaac Davis slain by musket fire. His horn was later inscribed “XIX†in commemoration of the day. The powder horn descended through the Barrett/Stow/Eaton family and was donated to the Concord Museum in 1994. ⁄avid Bohl photo

Highlights of the exhibition include a needlework picture embroidered by Rebeckah Wheeler, who was born in Concord ten years after the town’s founding. The picture was worked around 1667 just before her marriage to Peter Bulkeley, grandson of the Concord founder. It is a gift to the museum in 1861, having descended through four generations.

“The Bloody Massacre,” the famed Revere engraving that was a milestone in America’s road to independence, owned by Emerson Cogswell, a hatmaker in 1775 Concord, was a gift to the museum in 2002 by Cogswell’s great-great-great-granddaughter.

Private Abner Hosmer’s powder horn, worn at the fight at the North Bridge, April 19, 1775, where the 21-year-old Acton native was killed, was a gift to the museum in 1936.

An early Nineteenth Century desk and bookcase of Dr Josiah Bartlett, a Concord physician for 57 years, together with his account book was a 1994 bequest to the museum from the estate of Edward J. Bartlett; the line of descent is recorded in pencil inscriptions on the side of the central drawer.

An Eighteenth Century high chest made in Concord and descended in the Wheeler family of Concord was a gift to the museum from the family of Emily and Wilfrid Wheeler in 1996.

A gold brooch with inset miniature portrait on ivory of Ellen Tucker Emerson, Ralph Waldo Emerson’s first wife, together with the shawl she is wearing in the 1830 portrait, was gifted to the museum in 1961 from Mr and Mrs F.P. Nash, descendants of Ellen’s sister Pauline Tucker Nash.

The Concord Museum is at the intersection of Lexington Road and Cambridge Turnpike, a quarter-mile mile east of Concord Center. For information, 978-369-9609, 978-369-9763 (reservations) or www.concordmuseum.org .