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William F. Eisner Museum of Advertising & Design facts for kids

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William F. Eisner Museum of Advertising & Design
William F. Eisner Museum of Advertising & Design

The William F. Eisner Museum of Advertising & Design, also known as The Eisner, was a special museum about advertising. It was located in the Historic Third Ward area of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in the United States.

About the Museum

The Eisner Museum taught visitors about how modern advertising and design have shaped American culture. It showed how ads affect society, history, and even art.

Museum Building and Opening

The museum was inside an old building that looked like it was from the Renaissance Revival style. This means it was built to look like buildings from the European Renaissance period. Architects Crane & Barkhausen designed the building, which was finished in 1895.

The museum itself opened in the year 2000. It was named after William F. Eisner, who was a very creative designer and a leader in advertising during the 1900s. After William Eisner passed away in 1990, his wife, Elaine, suggested the idea for the museum to the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD).

Collections and Closure

In February 2004, the Eisner Museum took over the collections from another museum called the American Advertising Museum in Portland, Oregon. The Eisner Museum did this by helping to pay off the other museum's debts.

The Eisner Museum closed its doors in 2010. This happened because the building where it was located was sold. As of 2015, no one knew what happened to all the items and records that belonged to the museum.

What the Museum Showed

The museum had many interesting exhibits. They showed different kinds of advertising and design.

Past Exhibits

Some of the cool things the museum showed included:

  • The famous Burma-Shave roadway billboards, which were signs placed along roads.
  • Work by Brooks Stevens, who was a very important industrial designer.
  • A look at 100 years of advertising for Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

Online Exhibits

The museum also had some exhibits that people could see online on the World Wide Web. These online shows looked at memorable types of advertising and design. For example, they featured the illustrations of Boris Artzybasheff and an exhibit called The Art of the Album Cover.