100 Years: A Cornerstone of Our Community
January 25 - June 1, 2025
 

This year marks the 100th Anniversary of the current Museum building and campus. The exhibition includes an engaging selection for rarely seen historic photographs, publications, and objects from The Museum archives and collections. Additional works are on loan from Dr. Ivan Bub.

In May of 1925, the cornerstone of the new structure was laid, capping more than two decades of expansion and growth that required a bigger structure. The Museum had its beginnings in 1904, when Levi W. Mengel was given permission to purchase exhibits from the Saint Louis World’s Fair. These, added to Mengel’s own natural history specimens and historic artifacts, formed the nucleus of the early museum collection.

The Museum’s first home was a Reading School District Administration Building located at Eighth and Washington Streets. It occupied the second and third floors of the building. At first, The Museum’s purpose was exclusively geared toward school children, but the founder quickly realized that the collections could become a resource and attraction for the broader community. It opened to the general public in 1913 and about ten years later, the decision was made to undertake the project of a purpose-built Museum at a new location.

There was much debate about the location of the new Museum. Some argued for a site in the urban fabric at City Park. Meanwhile, Irvin Impink and Ferdinand Thun made an offer of a parcel of land in the much more remote 18th Ward, adjacent to the Wyomissing Park neighborhood. Ground was broken in February of 1925 and the dedication ceremony held three years later in 1928. The doors opened with much fanfare as The Museum took center stage among Reading’s most important cultural resources. 100 years later, the Reading Public Museum is as vibrant and relevant as ever, offering school tours, adult programs and an array of engaging temporary and permanent exhibits for visitors from Berks County and beyond.