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Staunton's Frontier Culture Museum is expanding with the addition of an indoor space
A major expansion is underway at Staunton's Frontier Culture Museum.
The largest open-air living history museum in the Shenandoah Valley will soon include a new indoor gallery space. The American Journey Gallery is expected to be open fall 2027.
"We're an outdoor museum so when wintertime comes or we have inclement weather, visitors just drop off," said Butch Smiley, the museum's chief executive officer.
In January the museum had 690 visitors. A month later 800 people came through the gates. In March, when the weather was starting to become warmer, 8,500 people visited the museum.
"So it's a vast difference," Smiley said. "We've always had the goal as a museum to have an indoor facility so when the weather is bad, people will still be inclined to come."
The 40,000-square-foot facility will include a permanent exhibit gallery, rotating exhibit areas, a research library, flexible education rooms and an indoor/outdoor pavilion. The facility will cost $70 million and state funding has been secured to support the project. The Frontier Culture Museum is a state agency under the guidance of the Virginia Department of Education.
Cliff Edwards, the museum's deputy director, said the idea for the facility began in earnest in 2018 and is now coming to life before the eyes of the staff who see it every day.
"We stopped counting at 400 hours of Zoom meetings on design through COVID," Edwards said.
Excavation work is currently taking place at the site. The new gallery will be just to the left of the current visitors center and museum entrance. The work that passersby can see from Frontier Drive will be additional parking, an increase of 300 spots for both buses and cars.
The Frontier Culture Museum attracted 66,000 visitors in 2024. Smiley is optimistic that once the new facility is open the museum can double that number.
Just over a third of those visitors are students. Forty school divisions in Virginia — including Staunton, Waynesboro and Augusta County — and two in West Virginia have received funding through The Trailblazers Grant Program to attend the museum. Operated under the nonprofit arm of the museum, the grant program has awarded nearly $136,000 to date.
The current outdoor space features costumed historical interpreters demonstrating the life and customs of the indigenous Native American tribes in Virginia, the arrival of the German, English and Irish settlers along the Great Wagon Road, and the painful journey of the enslaved Africans to the first permanent British colony in North America.
The gallery will be very interactive, Smiley said, as the museum works to continue its mission of telling the story of the blending of European, African, and indigenous peoples into the United States.
"What we're really cognizant of is making sure we've got source material to be able to tell the story about folks that came over," Smiley said. "We have engaged 16 scholars throughout the nation as well as in Europe to help us tell that story."
Dorette Sobolewski, the museum's director of research, called the permanent exhibit the crown jewel of the indoor facility. Staff has been working on that for about 18 months. It will take up about 7,000 square feet of the facility.
The exhibit will cover the story that the Virginia frontier played in the creation of the United States. Visitors will follow the timeline from the earliest days until present time.
"We've recruited the scholars to make sure we get the content right," Sobolewski said. "It's a large story. It's a complicated story. The scholars don't always agree on some of this. We need to base our final edits, our final content on the most recent scholarship that is available."
Sobolewski worries about getting the stories accurate. She met with the Virginia Indian advisor recently, saying the advisor is intimately knowledgeable on interpreting the story of the Indigenous people of what would become Virginia.
"That's their story to tell," Sobolewski said. "It's not our story to tell. We have to make sure their perspective is represented respectfully and accurately."
The permanent exhibit will change very little, perhaps occasionally as they learn more information. The rotating exhibits will change every 18 months to two years.
"All the people that came before me, the ones who got this started, dreamed of having an indoor facility," Smiley said. "We're able to enjoy the benefits and see the finished product of what their goal was."
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— Patrick Hite is a reporter at The News Leader. Story ideas and tips always welcome. Connect with Patrick (he/him/his) at phite@ and on Instagram @hitepatrick. Subscribe to us at
This article originally appeared on Staunton News Leader: Staunton's Frontier Culture Museum undergoing major expansion
