Friends of the Missouri State Museum

03/20/2026

A piece of Missouri history has come home.

In 2025, a Civil War-era flag carried by Shelby's Missouri Iron Brigade was returned to Missouri after more than a century away. Now, it's in the care of the Missouri State Museum - but it needs urgent conservation.

Help us preserve this powerful artifact for future generations.

Donate today: secure.givelively.org/donate/friends-of-the-missouri-state-museum

11/24/2025

Tis' the season to shop local and support your museum!

Shop with purpose this holiday season! On Sunday Nov. 30th the Missouri State Museum will participate in Museum Store Sunday a national initiative of the Museum Store Association to encourage people to “be a patron” and look for unique gifts at their local museum. The State Museum store carries Missouri-themed gifts like state seal items and plush versions of native animals. Check out our holiday discounts on select items! You can also pick up a Missouri State Parks gift card for your favorite outdoor adventurer.

Can’t make it to Jefferson City? Check the Missouri State Museum’s page for photos of available merchandise. Place an order over the phone at 573-751-2854 or 573-522-9060, Monday – Friday 8:00 am – 4:00 pm.

Visit us on the first floor of the State Capitol, near the Rotunda. Museum Store hours are 8:30-4:00, seven days a week!

, , , ,

09/19/2022

We Want You! ...to serve on the Friends of the Missouri State Museum board! Message for details.

06/18/2022

Join us tonight!

It's Museum Week! Today's theme is dance and we have the perfect opportunity for our visitors to do just that. Join us tonight for the first Backyard Concert of the summer series.

From 7:00 - 8:00 p.m. the duo of Jerry Rabushka and Isaac Cherry will take the stage highlighting Missouri ragtime composers Scott Joplin, James Scott, Irene Giblin and more.

The concert is held on the lawn of the Lohman Building at Jefferson Landing State Historic Site (100 Jefferson St.). This is a family-friendly FREE event. We recommend you bring your own chairs or blankets. Perhaps even pack a picnic supper and join us for an evening of live music while you eat al fresco.

For more information please visit our Facebook events page or call 573-751-2854.

04/06/2022

First Wednesday of the month means After Hours!

https://mostateparks.com/event/92611/landing-after-hours-german-missourians-state

Two German Missourians were among the 41 delegates elected to the constitutional convention in 1820. What did they do at the convention and afterward? What shifts in political views did they witness between statehood and the Civil War? Join interpretive aide Stephana Landwehr as she shares historic....

09/22/2021

Check out this field trip experience from 1960! What is your favorite exhibit at the State Museum?

08/10/2021

Happy Birthday MO!

Timeline Tuesday! August 10th is Missouri Statehood Day! 200 years ago today in 1821 Missouri entered the Union as the 24th state. Happy Bicentennial Missouri!

Visit the museum to learn more about YOUR Missouri history in our Trailblazers exhibit and to view the 80 foot long Timeline. The museum is open daily with hours M-F 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. and is FREE.
For more information about our offerings please call 573-751-2854.



Illustration by Dan Zettwoch as seen on the museum's 80 foot long Missouri Bicentennial timeline in the History Hall.

06/23/2021

Timeline Tuesday! 147 years ago this week Illustrator and Missouri transplant Rose O'Neill was born.

In order to learn about the Kewpie Doll you are going to learn a little bit about its creator Rose O’Neill. Rose O’Neill was born on June 25, 1874 in Pennsylvania but grew up in Nebraska and moved to the Missouri Ozarks, in her adult years. She was from a very artistic family. They traveled by covered wagon from Pennsylvania to Nebraska. In Nebraska, Rose started to express her artistic side a bit more, she would enter various writing competitions and by the time she was nineteen years old she decided to travel to New York to showcase her artwork and stories to newspapers and magazine companies. These companies liked her work very much that they gave her a commission for her artwork or stories. Rose grew in fame and fortune for a number of years because of her success as a writer and cartoonist. Rose was a big supporter in the women’s suffrage movement and

One of Rose’s famous cartoons was a Kewpie doll, it made headlines in a women’s magazine on December 1909. The Kewpie drawing is an elf-like baby with a pot belly, top-knot head, wide smile, and sidelong eyes. In 1913, Rose decided to patent a doll based her Kewpie drawing and the first dolls were made in Germany. The Kewpie doll was showcased in stories, books, tableware, trinkets, and almost anything else you could think of; there is a high school in Columbia, MO, proudly bearing the Kewpie doll as a mascot that was adopted in 1914 when a basketball team had to play around the doll so they did not break it and it brought the team good luck. When the Great Depression came around; the success of the Kewpie doll dwindled into the background and so did Rose’s finances because the dolls weren’t in high demand anymore. Kewpie dolls were made in production until 1990s by Jesco and Cameo Co. but the difference between these dolls and Rose O’Neill’s dolls were they did not have the signature heart on the front.

To learn more about illustrator, Kewpie doll inventor and suffragist Rose O'Neill plan a visit to Bonniebrook Home and Museum in Walnut Shade, Mo. located between Springfield and Branson on Hwy 65.

Rose O'Neill and Bonniebrook Museum



Illustration on the Missouri Bicentennial timeline by Dan Zettwoch located in the museum's History Hall.

02/15/2021

01/03/2020

Missouri's Birthday is coming up!

Update: The submitted blocks have been stitched together!

We are thrilled to be able to partner with The State Historical Society of Missouri to celebrate Missouri 2021 Bicentennial with a Bicentennial quilt! Quilters from around the state submitted blocks, and today, our own Courtenay and Julia are stitching together the quilt top!

10/08/2019

There’s still time and there’s still beer!