In the late 1930s a local women's group started to look into the possibility of establishing a children's museum. It took a few&nbsp;years but it finally opened in 1945 as the Fort Worth Children's Museum. To attract adults without children the museum&nbsp;eventually became a general science museum in 1968 and changed its name to the current one. After several decades, administrators decided it was necessary to increase attendance and achieved this goal after introducing world-class traveling exhibits. As a result the museum needed a bigger space and launched the effort to build the current museum which opened in 2009.&nbsp;

The Fort Worth Museum of Science and History

Website

The Fort Worth Museum of Science and History houses a significant collection of 150,000 scientific and historical objects. The collection tends to focus on Texas but contains items from around the country as well. Other attractions at the museum include a planetarium and IMAX theater.


Fort Worth Museum of Science and History

This tour will guide you to the museums of Fort Worth's Cultural District. The tour starts with the Cowgirl Hall of Fame and includes a variety of museums dedicated to the culture, history, and art of central Texas.

Fort Worth Cultural Center Tour

The museum was founded by Vicki Bass and her husband,
Edward, in 1975. It began as a small collection of cowgirl memorabilia: some
belt buckles, a couple of bandanas, and works of art. The couple kept these
artefacts safe in the basement of the Deaf Smith County Library of Hereford,
Texas, but became dissatisfied with mere preservation. They wanted to start
spreading information about the exploits of these Wild West women. In 1993 they
began looking for a new venue, and found it the following year in Fort Worth. Many
of the initial members of staff and individuals that provided financial support
were themselves devoted cowgirls, brought up around horses and cattle. 

Architect David M. Schwarz was commissioned to design the
complex, and his Tulsa Deco design perfectly reflects the cowgirl heritage that
the museum contains. The finials are carved in the shape of local wild roses,
and visitors are immediately greeted by an enormous neon sign declaring
“Cowgirls” in bright blue lettering. A mural designed by Richard Haas depicts
five monochrome cowgirls riding through a colorful prairie, flanked by a Native
American woman and another cowgirl. Inside, the museum galleries are decorated
with carved horse heads, more wild roses, and carved art deco&nbsp;banisters. Some of the
more exceptional items include a silver saddle owned by writer and singer Dale
Evans, and a gun owned by sharpshooter Annie Oakley. Visitors can even mount a
bucking bronco, and try to stay on.

The museum is sited in an excellent location, and visitors
can go on to visit the <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=20216">Kimbell Art Gallery</a>, the <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=12509" title="Link: http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=12509">Modern Art Museum</a>, the <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=3243" title="Link: http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=3243">Museum
of Science and History</a>, and the <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=6391" title="Link: http://www.theclio.com/web/entry?id=6391">Amon Carter Museum</a>.

The National Cowgirl Museum is dedicated to the accomplishments of more than 450 past and present women in America, and seeks to inspire future generations to acquire the qualities of self-reliance and independence. Visitors can engage with interactive exhibitions, admire over four thousand works of art and artifacts, and watch documentaries celebrating the spirit of famous cowgirls. The National Cowgirl Hall of Fame honors over two hundred of the most renowned cowgirls that have ever lived. It also contains an extensive library, and continues to research the history of women in the West. 

National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame

Amon Carter was a co-founder of the&nbsp;Fort Worth Star-Telegram and overtime earned the wealth that would enable him establish the museum. Its name was changed to the American Carter Museum of Western Art in 1977. Upon the museum's 50th anniversary in 2011&nbsp;the name was given its current&nbsp;one.&nbsp;

Established in 1961, the Amon Carter Museum of American Art preserves and presents masterworks of American art from the 19th and 20th centuries. These include photographs, paintings, prints, sculptures and other works on paper (watercolors and drawings). Particular emphasis is placed on depictions of the Old West and those works that reflect key turning points in American history. Photographs are also an important component of the museum's collection. At 45,000 strong, they comprise one of the country's foremost collections of American photography, spanning from the medium's beginning to today. The museum's namesake, Amon G. Carter Sr. (1879–1955), led the effort to found the museum and to this end donated funds and his collection of Old West paintings by Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell. 


Amon Carter Museum of American Art 

Kay and Velma Kimbell established
the Kimbell Art Foundation to support their growing art collection in 1936.
Their art collection consisted of mostly British and French portraits from the seventeen-hundreds
and the eighteen-hundreds. The foundations goal was to encourage art in the
local community. One way the foundation accomplished this was by loaning the
art work to churches, libraries, and universities. In 1964 Kay Kimbell passed
away and left his fortune and collection, which had grown to 260 paintings and
86 other works of art, to the Kimbell Art Foundation.

In 1965 Richard F. Brown, under leadership
of the President of the Kimbell Art Foundation, Mr. A. L. Scott, and in
consultation with the nine-member Board of Directors of the Foundation, began the
development of the Kimbell Art museum. The architect chosen to design the
museum was Louis Kahn. The Kimbell Art Museum was opened in October 1972, and the
total cost of the Kahn Building was $6.5 million. 

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; In 2010
the exhibition and education programs had out grown the Kahn Building, and plans
for an addition building were made. Renzo Piano designed the second building,
which was called the Piano Pavilion. It was opened on November 27th,
2013. The permanent collections are displayed in the Kahn Building, and the
Piano Pavilion contains exhibitions, classrooms, and studios.

The Kimbell Art Museum started as the private art collection of Kay and Velma Kimbell. The museum was opened in 1972. Since then it has grown to around 350 pieces of high quality artwork. The museum is internationally renowned for both its collections and for its architecture. 

Kimbell Art Museum

The museum's name changed several times since its founding; the present one was designated in 1987. The current building was opened&nbsp;in 2002 and designed by the world-renowned Japanese architect Tadao
Ando. It consists of concrete and glass, allowing light to shine through to properly illuminate the art on display.

Founded in 1892 as the Forth Worth Public Library and Art Gallery, the Modern Art Museum of Forth Worth presents, as its name indicates, modern and contemporary art. It is the oldest museum in Texas and one of the oldest in the western half of the country. The museum houses almost 2,600 works of art including paintings, photographs and sculptures. The museum also offers many educational programs such as lectures, workshops and classes. Additionally, there is also a sculpture garden and a large reflecting pond.

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

Originally the brainchild of Fort Worth legend Amon G. Carter, Casa Mañana is a city-owned building that is currently home to a musical theater company. In 1930,&nbsp;Carter also led a group of community leaders to sponsor a major celebration in Fort Worth called the&nbsp;Texas Frontier Centennial.1 It was held on the land immediately east of the Will Rogers Memorial Center and placed under the direction of Billy Rose, the famous Broadway producer.2 A large area &nbsp;was filled with frontier-styled buildings and fronts&nbsp;which were used for various activities and performances. Numerous famous artists and actors&nbsp;were featured in Fort Worth's extravaganza, including Sally Rand, and Paul Whiteman.3 The original Casa Mañana was&nbsp;a 2,500 seat amphitheater, and&nbsp;a part the 1936 production. The building was also a part of&nbsp;Sally Rand's (Nude) Dude Ranch. The Fort Worth Frontier Centennial was widely promoted in Dallas and across the country as the place to go for "wild and whoo-pee" entertainment.4 Locals insist that Casa Mañana helped spark the ongoing&nbsp;rivalry between Dallas and Fort Worth.&nbsp; Casa Mañana was abandoned during World War Two,&nbsp;and the steel was used for the war effort. The lot where it sat, on the corner of University and Lancaster, was empty save for some&nbsp;concrete and rubble.&nbsp;Casa Mañana was gone, but not&nbsp;forgotten.&nbsp; In 1958, the Fort Worth City Council approved the construction of a brand new&nbsp;civic amphitheater.5 Casa Mañana Musical, Inc., a non-profit corporation named after the popular outdoor theater built for the 1936 Texas Centennial celebration, agreed to lease the building and produce live entertainment.6 An air-conditioned, aluminum-domed playhouse opened on July 5, 1958. The A. George Kind designed&nbsp;building features an aluminum geodesic dome. The dome was&nbsp;designed by Henry Kaiser and Richard Buckminster Fuller, and was only the second dome of its kind built in the United States.7&nbsp; The dome continued the tradition of tent-like, open air summer theater, while providing audiences&nbsp;with a break from the brutal Texas heat. More than 1,800 audience members could enjoy a night at one of the finest theaters in the United States, a fact that Fort Worth&nbsp;officials took great pride in.&nbsp; Since 1958, Casa Mañana has annually brought Broadway musicals and other live theater to Fort Worth. In the 1990s, a smaller Casa on the Square was opened in downtown Fort Worth. Starting in 1998, larger productions were held in the Bass Performing Art Center, also in downtown Fort Worth.&nbsp; After a decade of planning and fundraising, Casa Mañana Theatre was renovated in 2003 into a state-of-the-art performance venue. This renovation took the theater from an 1,800 seat "in-the-round" venue to a 1,300 seat "thrust" stage.&nbsp;The renovation also added space for the expansion of Casa’s nationally-recognized educational programs and for the accommodation of a broad variety of community meetings, performances and other events. Since 1936, the Casa Mañana stage has launched the careers of stars, and delighted Texas audiences.&nbsp;

Casa Mañana is a historic theater located in the heart of Fort Worth's Cultural District. Originally an outdoor amphitheater, Casa opened in 1936 as part of the official Texas Centennial Celebration. On July 5, 1958, a new Casa Mañana opened in the same location as the original, this time as a fully enclosed, air conditioned, domed, in-the-round theatre. Casa is one of the only examples of an aluminum dome structure left in the entire world.

Casa Mañana

The Fort Worth Municipal Rose Garden officially opened on October 15, 1933. At the time it was part of Rock Springs Park, which was established in 1912 and gradually developed with trails, ponds, waterfalls,&nbsp;and lagoons. Landscape architecture firm Hare &amp; Hare designed the rose garden and developed a comprehensive plan for the rest of the park. In 1934, the park's name was changed to the Fort Worth Botanic Garden. The Japanese garden was designed by Kingsley Wu and&nbsp;is located on a gravel pit once used as a trash midden by the army during WWII. A modern Garden Center was built in the mid-1980s.&nbsp;

The Fort Worth Botanic Garden was established in 1933, making it the oldest botanic garden in the state. It is historically significant for its landscape design and terraced municipal rose garden, which was modeled after Italian and French formal gardens of the 16th-18th centuries. It features a water cascade, geometric flower beds, a reflection pool, and a pond. The garden has grown to over 20 specialty garden spaces and also features a rain forest conservatory, a perennial trial garden, and a boardwalk. Another highlight is the Japanese garden, which was added in 1973 and includes a koi (fish) pond, waterfall, teahouse complex, pagoda, and bridges.

Fort Worth Cultural Center Tour

Fort Worth Museum of Science and History

Introduction

Images

Backstory and Context

Sources

Additional Information