FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 10, 2024
Douglas County Museum Now Open Seven Days a Week
(Douglas County, Ore) The Douglas County Board of Commissioners along with staff at the Douglas County Museum of History and Natural History are pleased to announce that they are extending hours of operation at the Douglas County Museum to now be open every day of the week from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. Starting this Monday, May 13, 2024, visitors can stop and explore the museum seven days a week.
Being at the heart of a natural resource-based economy, the Douglas County Museum pays homage to the mining, fishing, farming, and timber industries in Douglas County. Open to visitors for over 50 years, the Museum boasts Oregon’s largest natural history collection with more than 7,500 preserved items that help tell the ancient and contemporary stories of the Umpqua River Valley. It showcases the wonderful ecological diversity of our county, as it traverses an amazingly wide range of elevations, environments, vegetation, and creatures from the snowcapped peaks of Mt. Thielsen in the Cascade Mountain Range, through the Umpqua Valley – which is defined by the watershed basin of the Umpqua River, then over the Coastal Mountain Range to the crashing surf of the Pacific Ocean in Winchester Bay. The Museum also features cultural and period relics from a time when Native Americans inhabited the mountains, streams, and shores of the County. Home to humans for more than 10,000 years, the valley is named for the Umpqua Tribe that still calls this area home. It then chronicles the journey of the first non-native explorers, pioneers and settlers that came to our area as fur trappers, missionaries, prospectors, loggers, farmers, and fishermen.
Make sure to explore “The Archie Creek Fire” exhibit. The limited-time exhibit documents the most disastrous wildfire in Douglas County history that ravaged the community of Glide in September 2020. “The Archie Creek Fire” exhibit utilizes a seamless combination of film interviews, live-recorded videos, drone footage, photographs and artifacts that take you on a journey from the explosive front lines to the suppression efforts to unimaginable evacuations to the ashes of the aftermath. It tells the story of real people, their heartbreaking and heroic experiences, and the challenges they faced then and for some, the challenges they still face today. In the main hall make sure you check out the “Pioneer History of Wine,” an exhibit that details local viticulture and the people that put the Umpqua Valley on the wine map of the world.
The Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History is located at 123 Museum Drive in Roseburg, Oregon (conveniently located off I-5 Exit 123 and adjacent to the Douglas County Fairgrounds). It is open seven days a week from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. It can take 1-3 hours to tour the museum depending on your pace. The Lavola Bakken Research Library is open Tuesday through Saturday 1:00 pm – 4:30 pm. Admission is free for members, ages 0-4 are free, students 5-17 are $2.00, adults are $8.00, seniors and veterans are $5.00. The "Museum Mercantile," our museum gift shop, offers the area’s leading source of books on Douglas County’s natural and cultural history, as well as a wide range of Oregon souvenirs and other great gift items including educational and historic toys. Click here for more information or to find out about volunteering at our Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History or call the Douglas County Museum at (541) 957-7007.
“We are excited to open the Douglas County Museum to visitors seven days a week! We encourage everyone to take the time to visit or revisit this local gem. Many residents don’t take advantage of the opportunity to explore it. So, gather the family and add it to your next Sunday drive or road trip list, you won’t be disappointed.” – Commissioner Tom Kress.
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Media Contact: Tamara Howell, Douglas County Emergency Communications & Community Engagement Specialist, Douglas County Public Affairs Office | Office: (541) 957-4896 | Cell: (541) 670-2804 | Email: tamara.howell@douglascountyor.gov
Photo Credit: K.Trenkle/Douglas County