Permanent Gallery

The Oakland Museum of California is undergoing a major transformation project. To learn more, start here: www.museumca-campaign.org

The Art and History Galleries are currently under renovation, and will reopen in 2009. Please visit our special exhibitions, Natural Sciences Gallery. or join us for special events.

We apologize for any inconvenience. Thank you for your understanding during this very busy time.

Cowell Hall of California History

Culture and Confluence  exhibit. California Indians and the Missions.

What makes California, California? Explore that question in the Cowell Hall of California History in the permanent exhibition California: A Place, A People, A Dream. Meet the people who have shaped California -- natives, adventurers, wealth-seekers, health-seekers, colonists, settlers, newcomers, old-times, sun-worshippers, reformers, upper class to underclass -- people of all colors -- and the dreams they have pursued.

Explore the forces that have shaped California -- the environment, the Gold Rush, earthquakes, wartime, the computer chip, Hollywood, the automobile, social and political protest, countercultures, discrimination, leisure and benevolent climate, freedom and opportunity. Encounter the objects that tell this history. They are the tangible part of the story of how we became what we are, for history did not begin with the printed or even the written word. The history of California does not date from the arrival of the first European and the written reports of explorers and friars, but from eons earlier in the tales told by ancient storytellers around tribal campfires. Listen to the voices and hear the California story. Take a close look at objects mundane and magnificent. Seek out your own story. Remember we are all part of history-making in California.