About | EMS Museum & Art Gallery

The mission of the Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum & Art Gallery is to serve the college, University, and broader community as an informed educational and technical resource for science, art, and history of the earth and mineral sciences through the preservation, utilization, and promotion of our diverse collections.

The Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum & Art Gallery is unique. We draw upon our diverse collections of earth materials, scientific instruments and tools, and industrial art to create exhibits highlighting the history of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences and extractive industries of Pennsylvania. Our exhibition gallery includes displays of fluorescent minerals, flexible sandstone, fossils of every sort, sculptures, paintings, meteorites, meteor-wrongs, mine safety lamps, cartographic tools, and a historic geological relief map of Pennsylvania (among other things). We use our collections to help us fulfill our mission of serving the college, university, and broader community as an informed educational and technical resource for science, art, and history of the earth and mineral sciences.

History

The Museum & Art Gallery was established in 1859 when the Pennsylvania State Legislature consigned one of four cabinets of the state's mineralogical and geological collection to Farmers' High School--the institution that became Pennsylvania State College and then the Pennsylvania State University.

People

The EMS Museum & Art Gallery currently has a two-person staff consisting of the director and a curator who work closely with the collections and exhibits. The museum also has an active advisory board drawn from the faculty, staff, alumni, and students of the EMS college and the University, as well as local and regional educators, learners, and entrepreneurs.

Students are also engaged in all areas of the museum. Volunteers and interns work to curate and care for museum collections, and gallery attendants are the public face of the museum in the Deike Gallery. The museum also sponsors a student-led group called MANTLE (Museum Advisory Network for Total Learning Engagement).