Spurlock Museum

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Location

600 S. Gregory St.

Urbana, IL 61801

Spurlock Museum as seen from Gregory St.

Contact

(217) 333-2360

Website

Spurlock Museum website

Overview:

The Spurlock Museum is located within the campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Permanent exhibits are contained in five main galleries which feature cultural artifacts from Ancient Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt, and Africa; Ancient Greece and Rome; East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania; Europe; and American Indian Cultures of North and South America. Special exhibits are based in the Campbell Galley, which often have corresponding events, programs, and tours.

Admission is free, but there is a suggested donation of $3.

Museum Hours:

Monday: Closed
Tuesday: 12-5
Wed, Thurs, Fri: 9-5
Saturday:10-4
Sunday: 12-4

History:

In 1911, the University of Illinois Board of Trustees approved the establishment of two new institutions: a Classical Museum and a European Culture Museum. In 1917, a third institution was added, The Oriental and Archaeology Museum. All three were located on the fourth floor of Lincoln Hall, on the west side of the University Quadrangle.

Each of the original directors, Dr. Neil Brooks (European), Dr. Arthur Pease (Classical), and Dr. Albert Olmstead (Oriental) was concerned with acquiring the best possible collections for his museum, both for historical significance and educational use. It was during these first years that important pieces in today's collections, such as a leaf of the Gutenberg Bible and twenty-nine papyri fragments from the ancient Greek colony of Oxyrhynchus, were acquired. However, even in the early days of these institutions there was talk about the need to construct a new building to make the artifacts more accessible to the public.

In 1929, the Classical and Oriental Museums were combined, to be joined by the European Museum in 1954. From this solid base, the museum began to broaden its interests to areas not previously covered in the collections. Contemporary and non-Western artifacts were added to the ledgers alongside Greek statues and suits of armor. One of the first areas of development was in pieces from sub-Saharan Africa. By 1971, this multicultural focus was reflected in a new name, the World Heritage Museum.

With the growth of the collections came a change in the look of the galleries. During the 1980s and 90s the exhibits on the ancient and Medieval world were completely redesigned and joined by new permanent exhibits: "An African Encounter" and "Beyond the Himalayas." Temporary exhibits like "The Carozzis on the Road" and "People of the Book" greatly increased visitation. The new exhibits inspired continued donations of important artifacts.

Talk of a new building, where the museum's collections could be more accessible to the public, again came to the fore. In 1990, the generous donation of William and Clarice Spurlock made the planning of a new, state-of-the-art facility a reality. Since their gift, many other friends of the museum have given generously to assure that the Spurlock Museum is everything that the original directors had envisioned... and much, much more.²

Virtual Tour:

As a part of their interactive website, the Spurlock Museum offers a virtual tour of the Museum. According to Spurlock, this virtual tour is an interactive environment that allows users to navigate through a recreation of the Spurlock Museum’s physical Feature Galleries.

Every effort has been made to reproduce the physical galleries for your enjoyment online, but certain content exists only in the physical galleries or in online enhancements.

Just as the Museum’s physical galleries have been curated with everyone in mind, this virtual tour also caters to many users, including curious visitors, scholars, curators, and educators.³

Website for the Virtual Tour: http://www.spurlock.illinois.edu/exhibits/vtour/index.html