Guam Museum facts for kids
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Front of the Guam Museum in 2019
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| Established | 1980 |
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| Location | 193 Chalan Santo Papa Juan Pablo Dos Hagåtña, GU 96910 |
| Type | Culture, History, Art |
| Collection size | 250,000 |
The Guam Museum, also known as the Senator Antonio M. Palomo Guam Museum & Chamorro Educational Facility, is a special place that teaches us about the history of Guam. Guam is a U.S. territory located in Micronesia. The museum has many items that show what life was like in Guam long ago and how it has changed.
A permanent building for the museum opened in Hagåtña on November 4, 2016. Before this, the Guam Museum had been in different temporary spots since World War II.
Contents
The Museum's Story
How the Museum Started and What Happened to It
The Guam Museum first began in 1932. It was started by a group called the American Legion Mid-Pacific Post 1 in Agana, Guam (which is now Hagåtña). The American Legion ran the museum for a few years.
In 1936, the United States Navy took over the museum. That same year, the Governor of Guam, George A. Alexander, made the Guam Museum an official government place. The museum's first collection included old papers and items from Guam's history before the Spanish arrived.
Sadly, during World War II, Guam was invaded by Japan in December 1941. It was occupied until 1944. The original museum building and everything inside it were destroyed during the 1944 Battle of Guam. This was when American forces helped free the island from Japanese control.
Finding New Homes: Temporary Locations
After the war, no new museum building was built for a long time. On November 24, 1953, Governor Ford Quint Elvidge created a committee to restart the Guam Museum. He also asked the museum to help protect old Spanish buildings and study Guam's history, old stories, and geology.
Even though there was a committee, a permanent home for the museum was still not built.
Antonio Palomo, a former Senator, journalist, and historian who knew a lot about Guam, became the director of the Guam Museum in December 1995. He worked hard to get a permanent building for the museum. He retired on June 13, 2007.
In April 2004, the Guam Museum opened a special exhibit about Guam's history inside the Micronesia Mall. This exhibit was very popular, and about 200,000 people visited it.
Planning a Permanent Home
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At first, people thought about putting the new Guam Museum at the historic Fort Santa Agueda in Hagåtña. However, this fort is a protected historical site, so it couldn't be used for the museum.
Plans for a new, modern museum building were first shown to the public in 2006.
A special ceremony to start building the new museum happened on February 5, 2013. This new building cost $27 million. It was designed to hold artifacts from Guam's 4,000-year history. The museum is located in Skinner Plaza in downtown Hagåtña, close to the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica.
The new museum building has three floors and includes a cafe, an outdoor area for activities, a theater, and a bookstore.
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At the groundbreaking ceremony, Governor Eddie Calvo said that the Guam Museum would help make Hagåtña a lively place again. He also promised that historical items from Guam that were in other places like the Philippines, Europe, and Hawaii would be brought back to the museum.
Some people were concerned about the new museum. They worried about its high cost and its location. The museum was built on 27 percent of an existing city park in Hagåtña. Also, the area sometimes floods, which could harm the collection. However, the chairman of the Guam Museum Foundation, Monte Mesa, explained that they had fixed these worries. The museum is built on higher ground, and the most important items are kept on the upper floors, safe from any floodwater.
The Permanent Museum Opens
The Guam Museum officially opened its doors on November 4, 2016. It is managed by the Guam Department of Chamorro Affairs. The museum's collection has more than 250,000 items, including artifacts, documents, and photographs.
The main exhibit, called "I Hinanao-Ta Nu Manaotao Tåno’-I CHamoru Siha: The Journey of the CHamoru People," opened in 2018. The building has a gallery for exhibits on the ground floor, a room for different events, and an indoor theater. The museum also hosts outdoor movie nights in Skinner Plaza.
See also
In Spanish: Museo de Guam para niños
