Charles Willson Peale opens America's first museum of national history in Philadelphia

Historical Context Note

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.2: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Nineteenth Century, 1783-1900.
Vol. editors: J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University)

Domains

Organisations and institutions (scientific)

Dates

Date of occurrence 1794

Places

United States (Location)

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American painter and naturalist Charles Willson Peale (15th April, 1741 - 22nd February, 1827) opened the Philadelphia Museum in 1786, America's first museum of natural history. Peale's system of cataloguing artefacts and his vision of a cultural resource that would be widely appealing and accessible to all, formed the basis of museums as we know them today.

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