Museums started out as simple cabinets of curiosities in which interesting “stuff” was displayed. Sometimes this “stuff” was identified and explained, and sometimes it was simply displayed. As museums developed as educational institutions, more emphasis was placed on explaining the “stuff” displayed.
One of the people who helped change the way museums displayed artifacts was the Seneca Indian archaeologist Arthur Caswell Parker. Parker saw museums as integral to American democracy because they encouraged good citizenship. He advocated the idea that museums should be accessible to everyone and viewed them as the university of the common person. He promoted an interactive relationship between exhibits and the museum visitor and insisted that museums cultivate a set of concerns with which the visitors could relate. Parker wrote:
“People want to be entertained by exhibits, sights and sounds. They want sensory stimulation. They want to be thrilled by what they experience in a museum, not merely bored by long labels and crowded cases. People want to painlessly absorb stimulating knowledge, a knowledge that makes them talk about it.”
While working at the New York State Museum from 1906 to 1915 Parker created a series of six dioramas depicting Iroquois life. The dioramas, recognized as the finest exhibits of their kind in the country, attracted over 200,000 visitors per year. To make sure that the dioramas were accurate, Parker had artists and sculptors use models with features and facial figures that conformed with typical Seneca types. He also employed many Indians from New York and Canada to carefully reproduce the clothing and artifacts for each of the scenes. Even the backgrounds in the dioramas were based on artists’ impressions of actual archaeological sites.
Today’s museums often use dioramas—sometimes miniature models and sometime life-sized displays—to help explain the material which they have on display. Shown below are some museum dioramas.
Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump
Museum of the Upper Missouri
The Museum of the Upper Missouri displays the history of Fort Benton, Montana.
Polson Museum
The Polson Museum in Hoquiam, Washington is housed in the F. Arnold Polson House which was constructed in 1924 and is a National Historic Site.
Chehalis
Heritage Museum, Libby, Montana
Seaside, Oregon, Historical Society Museum
Oregon Historical Society