Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

{{Short description|Natural history museum in California}} {{Redirect|LACM|for the college of music in Los Angeles|Los Angeles College of Music}} {{More citations needed|date=December 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=January 2025}} {{Infobox museum | name = The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County | logo = Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County Logo.png | image = NaturalHistoryMuseumOfLosAngelesCounty.jpg | caption = The east entrance and façade | map_type = | map_caption = | coordinates = {{coord|34|1|1|N|118|17|16|W|display=title,inline}} | established = {{Start date|1913}} | dissolved = | location = Exposition Park<br />Los Angeles, California | type = Natural history museum | visitors = about 1 million annually | director = Lori Bettison-Varga<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-et-cm-new-nhm-president-20150709-story.html |title=Lori Bettison-Varga named new president of L.A. County's Natural History Museum |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |date=July 8, 2015 |first=Mike |last=Boehm |access-date=July 15, 2016}}</ref> | curator = | public_transit = {{rint|losangeles|lacmta}} {{rint|losangeles|expo}} Expo Park/USC, Expo/Vermont | website = {{URL|nhm.org}} {{Infobox NRHP | name = Natural History Museum | embed = yes | nrhp_type = | image = | caption = | location = 900 Exposition Blvd<br />Los Angeles, California  | locmapin = USA Los Angeles Metropolitan Area#California#USA | built = 1913 | architect = Hudson & Munsell | architecture = {{hlist|Beaux-Arts|Neoclassical|Romanesque|Plateresque}} | added = March 4, 1975 | area = {{cvt|6|acre|ha|1}} | refnum = 75000434<ref name="nris">{{cite web |title=Natural History Museum|url=https://npgallery.nps.gov/AssetDetail/NRIS/75000434|publisher=United States Department of the Interior – National Park Service|date=March 4, 1975}}</ref> }} }}

'''The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County''' is a museum located in Exposition Park in Los Angeles, next to the California Science Center. It is the largest natural and historical museum in the Western United States,<ref>{{cite web |title=Libraries & Museums |url=https://lacounty.gov/things-to-do/libraries-museums/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160629100204/http://www.lacounty.gov/things-to-do/libraries-museums |archive-date=June 29, 2016 |access-date=July 15, 2016 |website=County of Los Angeles}}</ref> with a collection of nearly 35 million specimens and artifacts covering 4.5 billion years of history. This large collection consists of not only specimens for exhibition but also vast research collections housed on and offsite.

The museum is associated with one other museum in Greater Los Angeles: the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits in Hancock Park. The two museums work together to achieve their common mission: "to inspire wonder, discovery, and responsibility for our natural and cultural worlds".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nhm.org/site/about-our-museums/mission |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090908220007/http://www.nhm.org/site/about-our-museums/mission |archive-date=2009-09-08 |title=Mission | website=Natural History Museum of Los Angeles}}</ref>

==History== [[File:Antonio Coronel.png|thumb|left|upright|Considered one of the first preservationists in Los Angeles,<ref>{{cite magazine| url=https://www.lamag.com/culturefiles/becoming-los-angeles/| magazine=Los Angeles| title=Fascinating Objects Tell the Story of L.A. in This Revamped Exhibit| first=Marielle| last=Wakim| date=May 15, 2018| access-date=March 16, 2022}}</ref> Californio politician Antonio F. Coronel's donations formed the original collection of the museum.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://southwest.library.arizona.edu/true/body.1_div.6.html |title=Antonio de Coronel |access-date=2020-12-12 |archive-date=2015-09-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150909230302/http://southwest.library.arizona.edu/true/body.1_div.6.html |url-status=dead }}</ref>]] NHM opened in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, California, in 1913 as The Museum of History, Science, and Art. The moving force behind it was a museum association founded in 1910. Its distinctive main building with fitted marble walls and domed and colonnaded rotunda, is on The National Register of Historic Places. Additional wings opened in 1925, 1930, 1960, and 1976.

The museum split in 1961 into The Los Angeles County Museum of History and Science and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). LACMA moved to a new location on Wilshire Boulevard in 1965, and the Museum of History and Science was renamed The Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. Eventually, the museum renamed itself again to The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County.

In 2003, the museum began a campaign to transform its exhibits and visitor experience. The museum reopened its seismically retrofitted renovated 1913 rotunda, along with the new "Age of Mammals" exhibition<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-natural-history-museum-20100704,0,3635610.story |title='Age of Mammals' at The Natural History Museum |date=July 4, 2010 |first=Suzanne |last=Muchnic |newspaper=Los Angeles Times}}</ref> in 2010. Its Dinosaur Hall opened in July 2011. A new Los Angeles history exhibition, "Becoming Los Angeles", opened in 2013. The outdoor Nature Gardens and Nature Lab, which explore L.A. wildlife, also opened in 2013.

In 2024 the museum opened a new wing of the museum called the NHM Commons.<ref>{{Cite web |title=NHM Commons Opening Day Celebration & Block Party {{!}} Natural History Museum |url=https://nhm.org/calendar/commons-opening-celebration |access-date=2025-09-26 |website=nhm.org |language=en}}</ref> The commons is {{convert|75,000|ft2|m2}} and includes Gnatalie, a green-boned sauropod that's over 75 ft long; it is located on the southwest side of the museum. The commons aims to be a community space with a combination of indoor and outdoor experiences including a welcome area, a lobby with a shop, a theater, a café, and a plaza.<ref>{{Cite web |title=NHM Commons {{!}} Natural History Museum |url=https://nhm.org/nhm-commons |access-date=2025-09-26 |website=nhm.org |language=en}}</ref>

==Research and collections== The museum maintains research and collections in the following fields:

* Annelida * Anthropology and Archaeology * Crustacea * Echinoderms * Entomology * Ethnology * Herpetology * History * Ichthyology * Invertebrate paleontology * Malacology * Mammalogy * Mineralogy * Ornithology * Vertebrate paleontology

The museum has three floors of permanent exhibits. Among the most popular museum displays are those devoted to animal habitats, dinosaurs, pre-Columbian cultures, The Ralph M. Parsons Discovery Center and Insect Zoo, and the new Nature Lab, which explores urban wildlife in Southern California.

The museum's collections are strong in many fields, but the mineralogy and Pleistocene paleontology are the most esteemed, the latter thanks to the wealth of specimens collected from The La Brea Tar Pits.

The museum has almost 30 million specimens representing marine zoology. These include one of the largest collections of marine mammal remains in the world, housed in a warehouse off site, which at over 5,000 specimens is second in size only to that of The Smithsonian.<ref>{{cite magazine| url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/industrial-l-theres-warehouse-filled-bones-whales-180955960/| last=Fessenden| first=Marissa| title=In L.A. There's a Warehouse Filled with Whale Bones| magazine=Smithsonian| date=July 20, 2015}}</ref>

The museum's collection of historical documents is held in The Seaver Center for Western History Research.<ref>{{cite web| title=About the Seaver Center| url=http://www.nhm.org/site/research-collections/seaver-center| website=Natural History Museum Los Angeles County| access-date=31 December 2016}}</ref>

==Special exhibits== The museum hosts regular special exhibitions which augment its collections and advance its mission. Recent special exhibits have included Mummies and Pterosaurs, both in 2016. The museum has also recently hosted exhibits that incorporate pop culture, such as an exhibit promoting ''House of the Dragon'' in 2022.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2022-08-05 |title=House of the Dragon:The Targaryen Dynasty {{!}} Natural History Museum |url=https://nhm.org/houseofthedragon |access-date=2023-05-30 |website=nhm.org |language=en}}</ref> There have also been Los Angeles themed special exhibits such as a ''Becoming Los Angeles'' that showcases Los Angeles history through the years, divided up into before 1929 and after 1929.<ref>{{cite web |title=Becoming Los Angeles |url=https://nhm.org/experience-nhm/exhibitions-natural-history-museum/becoming-los-angeles |website=Natural History Museum |access-date=24 April 2023}}</ref> Another example would be the current exhibit titled ''L.A. Underwater'' which exhibits almost 40 fossils from the prehistoric time, when the land where L.A. now is, was underwater.<ref>{{cite web |title=L.A. Underwater |url=https://nhm.org/la-underwater |website=Natural History Museum |access-date=24 April 2023}}</ref>

The museum also hosts a butterfly pavilion outside every spring and summer and a spider pavilion on the same site in the fall.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://nhm.org/site/explore-exhibits/special-exhibits/butterfly-pavilion |title= Butterfly Pavilion |website=Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County |access-date=2017-11-21}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://nhm.org/site/explore-exhibits/special-exhibits/spider-pavilion |title=Spider Pavilion |website=Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County |access-date=2017-11-21}}</ref>

Since 2017, the museum has hosted a special exhibit about P-22, the mountain lion that lived in nearby Griffith Park.<ref>{{cite web | url = https://nhm.org/experience-nhm/exhibitions-natural-history-museum/p-22 | website = Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County | title = P-22: The story of L.A.'s most famous feline}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title = 'LA's most famous feline,' P-22, gets a special exhibit at the Natural History Museum | website = KPCC 89.3 FM | date = 20 July 2017 | url = https://www.kpcc.org/2017-07-20/la-s-most-famous-feline-p-22-gets-a-special-exhibi | access-date = 27 October 2022}}</ref><ref name="elston2017">{{cite web | title = P-22 Shows His Stuff at the Natural History Museum | last = Elston | first = Christina | website = L.A. Parent | url = https://www.laparent.com/natural-history-museum-p-22-exhibit/ | date = 21 July 2017}}</ref>

==Architecture== Over the years, the museum has built additions onto its original building. Originally dedicated when The Natural History Museum opened in 1913, the rotunda is one of the museum's most elegant and popular spaces. Lined with marble columns and crowned by a stained glass dome, the room is also the home of the very first piece of public art funded by Los Angeles County, a Beaux-Arts statue by Julia Bracken Wendt entitled ''Three Muses'', or ''History, Science and Art''.<ref>{{cite book| last=Rubenstein| first=Charlotte Streifer| title=American Women Sculptors: A History of Women Working in Three Dimensions| url=https://archive.org/details/americanwomenscu0000rubi/page/108/mode/2up?q=wendt| publisher=G. K. Hall| location=Boston| year=1990| page=108| isbn=978-0-8161-8732-4| url-access=registration}}</ref>

==Film and television== *In 1996, Sheryl Crow filmed her "If It Makes You Happy" music video in the museum's Endangered Species Hall.<ref>{{Cite web |title=#DioramaChallenge {{!}} Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County |url=https://nhmlac.org/dioramachallenge |access-date=2025-09-28 |website=nhmlac.org |language=en}}</ref> *Honda filmed its "Matthew Broderick's Day Off" commercial at the museum.<ref>{{Cite web |title=#DioramaChallenge {{!}} Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County |url=https://nhmlac.org/dioramachallenge |access-date=2025-09-28 |website=nhmlac.org |language=en}}</ref> *The twenty-seventh season of ''The Bachelor'' was shot one of the dates inside the museum.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://news.artnet.com/art-world/bachelor-night-at-the-museum-date-2252870|title='The Bachelor' Sent a Couple on a Romantic Sleepover at a Natural History Museum, Where They Had a Candlelit Dinner Under Dinosaur Bones|website=Artnet|last=Cascone|first=Sarah|date=February 8, 2023|access-date=September 20, 2025}}</ref> *In 2025, Machine Gun Kelly filmed his music video for his song "vampire diaries" at the museum.

==Gallery== <gallery> File:LACMNH, 1956.jpg|Old east door of The Natural History Museum in 1956 File:Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History - Hall of African Mammals.JPG|Hall of African Mammals File:Triceratops mount.jpg|''Triceratops'' mount in the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County File:Natural History Museum of Los Angeles Rotunda.JPG|Museum rotunda File:Dinosaur statues outside NHMLAC.jpg|Dinosaur statues along the road leading to the museum </gallery>

== References == {{reflist}}

== External links == {{commons category}} * {{Official website|http://www.nhm.org/}} * [http://www.hartmuseum.org/ William S. Hart Ranch and Museum] * [http://www.tarpits.org/ George C. Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits] *[https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/20/arts/design/dinosaur-hall-at-los-angeles-museum-review.html?hpw=&pagewanted=all Review of the Museum's new Dinosaur Hall] at ''The New York Times'', July 19, 2011; [https://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/07/19/arts/20110720-DINO.html Slide show of exhibit] *[https://californiarevealed.org/partner/natural-history-museum-los-angeles-county/ Digitized materials from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County] at California Revealed

{{DEFAULTSORT:Natural History Museum Of Los Angeles County}} Category:Museums in Los Angeles Category:Exposition Park (Los Angeles) Los Angeles Category:Archaeological museums in California Category:Dinosaur museums in the United States Category:Geology museums in California Category:History museums in Los Angeles Category:Mesoamerican art museums in the United States Category:Mineralogy museums Category:Native American museums in California Category:Science museums in California Category:Science and technology in Greater Los Angeles Category:Botanical gardens in California Category:Butterfly houses Category:Gardens in California Category:Paleontology in California Category:Government buildings completed in 1913 Category:Government buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Los Angeles Category:Association of Science-Technology Centers member institutions Category:Institutions accredited by the American Alliance of Museums Category:Museums established in 1913 Category:1913 establishments in California Category:Beaux-Arts architecture in California Category:Mediterranean Revival architecture in California Category:South Los Angeles Category:Native Americans in Los Angeles