The home of the Edmond History Museum, located at 431 South Boulevard has a history itself.
It once served as the armory home of the Oklahoma Army National Guard’s 45th Infantry Division.
“During the New Deal in the 1930s when President (Franklin D.) Roosevelt was putting people to work, the decision was made to build a lot of infrastructure that would help communities,” Amy Stephens, Museum Director said. “And just after World War I, there was still a lot of heightened interest in safety and security, and so armories were high on that list. There were, I believe, 52 armories built in Oklahoma. A handful remains now, and a couple of them are museums and some community centers and warehouses. This armory was built in 1936 by the PWA. This was built by the workers in our community, and it was for the National Guard 45th Infantry Division.”
Stephens said the 45th drilled out of the building until a new armory was built on Bryant Street in Edmond.
She said the old armory, which is owned by the City of Edmond, was utilized for storing lawn equipment, non-profit offices, and a theater group.
“For about 10 years, it had multiple purposes, including serving as the office of the Edmond Historical Society, which evolved into the Edmond History Museum,” she said.
The mission of Edmond History Museum is to celebrate Edmond history through preservation and education. Museum hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday – Friday, and 1 p.m.-4 p.m. on Saturday.
Artifacts visually tell the story of Edmond from the land run to the present.
“We are a community museum,” Stephens said. “What makes us slightly unique compared to a lot of community museums is that we change exhibits frequently. It’s not the kind of place where you come and you see the farm equipment and then five years later, you come and it’s the same farm equipment on display. We have a few permanent exhibits to tell about how Edmond started and talk a little bit about the purpose of this building originally. But after that, we have 43,000 artifacts in our collection to tell different stories.”
Stephens said that variety of storytelling has led to an increase in visitors.
“We (museum team) put a lot of emphasis on marketing and helping people understand that this is a museum,” she said. “We do a lot more community programming than we used to, and we’re out in the community more. When the city remodeled the park that we’re sitting inside, that brought in a lot of new people who had never even been here. The number has impressively increased. A couple of years ago, our average attendance was between 15,000 and 20,000, which has been ongoing for several years. The last two years we’ve had over 30,000 visitors. This year, we were at 34,000. So, we almost doubled attendance from a couple of years ago.”
Stephens said the museum currently has a Vietnam War exhibit titled “Close to Home,” which pays homage to the service of those from Edmond in that war.
“Telling the story of wars is important,” she said. “In Edmond, we have such a large population of military members and veterans. And so, every few years, we are doing some kind of war topic. We were looking at the calendar, realizing that this is the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War and knew this was the time to tell a story that hadn’t been told in a while.”
Stephens added “What I think is important about this exhibit is we interviewed people who are still alive, and we’re telling their stories because they’re still around. And we’re so fortunate to be able to gather the information about what happened to them then, and how it affected the rest of their life, and where they are now because of it. We profile six individuals. Everything from pilots to being down on the ground fighting in the swamps. And so, the artifacts and stories are about real people and people that live here.”
Stephens said the museum also tells the history of Edmond’s fire department, and Edmond’s connection to the historic Route 66, which turns 100 in 2026.
“The exhibits we have are very Americana,” she said. “We are currently installing an exhibit on the history of the Edmond Fire Department. We felt like that was a colorful story that everybody could find some interest in. We do have a small permanent exhibit about Route 66 history. We don’t have a ton of huge artifacts. We have a lot of small things, and so it’s a smaller footprint.”
Stephens said in 2026 the museum will have a new exhibit focusing on Tammi Sauer, a local children’s author.
“Early next year, we will be focusing on one of our very prolific local writers, Tammi Sauer,” she said. “She’s published well over 30 children’s picture books, and many are award-winners. They were all done by traditional publishers. She’s just a rock star. We wanted to tell that because 52% of our visitors are children.”
The museum is also doing a partnership with the Edmond Quilt Guild as well as its annual 5th grade art contest.
“The quilt guild is bringing their experts in, and people can sign up for a session to bring their family quilts and have it assessed,” she said. “Every spring we do an art exhibit of 5th grade art about trees in our town. It’s an Arbor Day festival. So, we will continue with that.”
Stephens said within the next year, they are converting a garage space on the corner of the museum into an activity classroom space.
“We are naming it the Thunderbird Room in honor of the 45th,” she said. “We will have a large neon of the Thunderbird that will be hanging on the walls. We want to pay a little more homage to our veteran history here.” For more information visit
https://www.edmondhistory.org/ or by calling the museum at (405)-340-0078. Museum admission is free. •
story and photos by Van Mitchell, staff writer
