Museum of the American Military Family soon will open in Tijeras

Museum of the American Military Family, Tijeras

The Museum of the American Military Family, which once existed only online, opens next month along Route 66 in Tijeras, New Mexico, east of Albuquerque.

The museum‘s founder and executive director, Circe Olson Woessner, told the Rio Rancho Observer it plans a grand opening at 3:30 p.m. July 9. After being an online-only entity, it set up a temporary home at Bataan Military Academy in Albuquerque.

Volunteers spent recent weeks sorting memorabilia and displays for the move.

Woessner said the new facility will have an artifacts/exhibit area, a library, a crafts room, and a gift shop.
“We’re in a house,” she said. “(It’s) the former home of Molly, who established the historic destination bar bearing her name, so as visitors walk in they’ll see what could be the home of a military family that makes a new home every two or three years.”
Exhibition panels describe the various elements affecting family life in the military and the kinds of schools military children attend around the world.

Here’s the museum’s vision:

The Museum of the American Military Family and Learning Center is where people with shared and converging paths come together as community, inspiring a sense of place and history. As a repository for their stories, we shape the future by preserving our heritage, recording its evolution, and inviting dialogue by sharing our experiences with the world.

The curator thinks the new site is a good one because of the scenery of the Sandia Mountains and being along old Route 66.

The Museum of the American Military Family will be stationed at 546 New Mexico Highway 333, aka Route 66, in Tijeras (map here). It sits next to Molly’s Bar. Hours will be from 12:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.

(Some of the memorabilia at the Museum of the American Military Family via Facebook)

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