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The National Park Service maintains 9 visitor centers and museums and is responsible for maintenance of historical structures and many of the other 2,000 buildings
Yellowstone’s museum collection contains more than 300,000 items that, along with the archives and library collection, document the cultural and natural history of the park. The museum collection includes archeological artifacts and fossils; uniforms, weapons and vehicles; hotel furnishings, souvenirs, and ephemera; rocks and minerals; wildlife and herbarium specimens; illustrated manuscripts; Thomas Moran watercolors and other original works of art; and over 90,000 photographs and stereographs, including more than 1,000 images by photographer William Henry Jackson.
Albright Visitor Center & Museum
The visitor center and all the red-roofed, many-chimneyed houses down the street from it were built by the U.S. Cavalry during a time when this was "Fort Yellowstone," an Army post dedicated to protecting the national park. Although the soldiers left after the Park Service was created in 1916, outwardly the old fort has changed little from the time of Army residency. Fort Yellowstone, comprised mostly of this block and the two rows of buildings behind it, is one of the best remaining examples of a 1900-era cavalry post.
The visitor center (formerly bachelor officers' quarters) now houses a museum with its major theme being history: Native Americans (pre-1800), the mountain men (1807-1840), early exploration (1869-1871), the Army days, and early National Park Service. In early 1998, new exhibits with a predator-prey theme were installed upstairs.
Of special note are the Moran Gallery where fine reproductions of watercolor sketches by the painter and expeditioner Thomas Moran are displayed and the Jackson Gallery where original photographs by William Henry Jackson, also of the 1871 Hayden Survey, are exhibited.
Look here for Infos about all the Visitor Centers:
nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/visitorcenters.htm |
