Martha Owens Morse (1839–1903) and Elizabeth Morse Genius (1872–1928) were the wife and daughter, respectively, of Chicago industrialist and Winter Park philanthropist Charles Hosmer Morse for whom the Museum is named. Jeannette Genius McKean (1909–1989), his granddaughter, founded the Museum in 1942. The exhibition features bonnets, cloches, and flowery straws bearing labels from Chicago, New York, and Paris—all expressing the best of the milliner’s art.