About The Bartlesville Area History Museum

The Bartlesville Area History Museum, a 10,000 sq. ft. facility is located on the top floor of the City Center, a historic building once home to the Hotel Maire during the Bartlesville oil boom. The Hotel featured a barbershop, poolroom, coffee shop, pharmacy and an extravagant lobby used for wedding receptions and other special occasions.

The community has a rich and colorful heritage with roots traced back to the Osage, Cherokee and Delaware peoples who lived in the region before the arrival of white settlers.

Through photographs, artifacts and video, Bartlesville’s heritage unfolds with stories of Indian chiefs, ranchers, bankers, outlaws, oilmen, schoolteachers, smelter workers, shop clerks and many others who helped to shape a tiny frontier settlement into a modern city.

That history unfolds for visitors to the museum with interactive displays, exceptional photography and intriguing artifacts. One of the museum’s most popular attractions is a talking animated likeness of Frank Griggs, pioneer photographer who spent seven decades documenting Bartlesville life.