Museums - San Diego Museum of Man

The Panama-California Exposition opened on January 1, 1915, and within it an anthropology exhibit titled The Story of Man through the Ages enjoyed considerable public acclaim. It had been assembled by Ales Hrdlicka of the Smithsonian and was the fruit of expeditions to Alaska, Siberia, Africa, and the Philippines, as well as loans from European institutions. As the exposition neared its close in November 1915, a farsighted group of San Diegans formed the San Diego Museum Association. Led by prominent citizen George Marston, they retained the valuable collections and established a museum of anthropology. Edgar L. Hewett became the first director, and important collections followed, notably the Jessop Weapon Collection and the Scripps Egyptian Collection. Fieldwork by museum staff in the 1930s focused on prehistoric sites of Southern California. Through the efforts of pioneer archaeologist Malcolm J. Rogers, hundreds of sites, many now destroyed by development, were recorded.
Because of the museum’s concentration on anthropology, its name was changed in 1942 to the Museum of Man. In 1966, the collection and research focus of the museum was narrowed to the peoples of the Western Americas. Important collections continued to be acquired, among them the Gildred Collection of pre-Hispanic Peruvian ceramics, and the Cannon Collection of Southern Californian Indian basketry. The museum’s collection is now in excess of 72,000 items plus 37,000 historic photographs (mostly of Native Americans) as well as unquantified archaeological holdings.
Permanent exhibits explore the Maya, ancient Egypt, the Kumeyaay Indians of San Diego County, human evolution, and the human life cycle.