Museum

California State Military Museum

The California State Military Museum is located just blocks from the State Capitol in the Old Sacramento State Historical Park and is operated for the California State Military Department by the California Military Museum Foundation, a IRS Code 501c(3) non-profit educational organization. Supported by the California Center for Military History, the museum is also a part of the United States Army Museum System and is the official military museum and historical research center for the State of California.

Today the museum houses over 30,000 military artifacts as well a substantial library and archives. The Major General Walter P. Story Memorial Library and Research Center is one of the finest collections of military history writings in the western United States. With over 10,000 volumes and growing rapidly, the library is one of the state's hidden educational and historical treasures. Topics range from general military history to very specific and one of a kind documents, such as original unit rosters of early California Militia units.

In addition to its facilities in Sacramento, the California State Military Museum also has four satellite museums: Camp Roberts Museum in Monterey County; Camp San Luis Obispo in San Luis Obispo County; the 40th Infantry Division Museum at the Joint Forces Training Base (Los Alamitos) in Orange County; and the 185th Armor and 251st Coast Artillery Regimental Museum in San Diego County and is an affiliate with the American Heritage Library and Museum in Glendale.

Thanks to the support of the Governor, the State Legislature, and the Adjutant General, California has one of the most active and innovative educational programs in the United States. We are in the process of taking the history out of the museum and are putting it into the classroom and home through the Internet with our California Military History Online website and through such programs as the World War II Submarine Veterans History Project and the California Military History Educational Project. These programs have been recognized by the Chief of Military History, United States Army as a model for other states to follow.

Produced in consort with the California State Military Museum, the California Military History Educational Project is a California State Legislative Grant-funded joint effort of the California State Military Museum, California State University Los Angeles, and the University of California at San Diego Supercomputer Center. The Project is aimed at teaching K-14 students about the importance of a civilian controlled military in our nation's history and the critical role California has played in that history. Upon its completion, the California Military History Educational Project will not only provide teachers, students and researchers access to the video reminiscences of our nation's veterans, but its educational web site will chronicle California's entire military history --from the Spanish period to the present day.

This innovative interactive online multi-media educational resource will ultimately include a "virtual field trip" of California's military history using on-line lesson plans and study units, examinations and discussion questions, teacher resource kits, oral histories, photo archives, data banks and special collections to promote the study of areas of historical importance. Ultimately, students will access to letters and diaries, photographs, military archives and other online data banks available through the California State Military Museum, enabling students to substantiate their research. The long-term goals of these projects are to dramatically advance the means by which we collect, store, and organize information in digital forms, and then to make them readily available for searching, retrieval, and processing via communication networks.

Among some of the museum's programs includes Museum Tours and its Speaker Program which provides speakers for schools, veterans groups, military units, and other civic organizations.