Collection
Search MOAH’s Collection Below!
"You know how you're looking around and all of a sudden you pick something up? Well, for me it was an old standard vacuum sweeper with a bellows in it. It was so different, I just had to buy it.” - Frank Livermore recounting the one artifact that started it all!
This humble-looking Standard Vacuum Sweeper is the reason this Museum exists. In the early 1970s, accountant Frank Livermore spotted this sweeper in the corner of a local junk shop and, intrigued by its mechanical workings, Frank bought it on the spot. From that day on, he became a collector, and soon his Menlo Park home was bulging at the seams with his eclectic collection of antique mechanical and electrical devices.
Frank’s friends joked that he should start a Museum of his own and, when one gave him a sign saying, Smithsonian West, Frank began to take the idea seriously. Frank and attorney Perry Moerdyke began the process of forming a registered non-profit Museum. In 1985 the Museum of American Heritage was incorporated. Frank’s collection formed the nucleus of the Museum. In 1990 the Museum of American Heritage opened at its first location on Alma Street in Palo Alto and in 1997 MOAH was awarded tenancy of the City of Palo Alto’s historic Williams House.
The Frank Livermore Trust was established to provide ongoing financial support for the care and maintenance of the collection.
Frank passed away in 2000, yet his curiosity and reverence for the spirit of innovation lives on in this Museum.
Today the collection boasts over 8,000 mechanical and electrical artifacts, largely dating from the 1850s to the 1950s, which are housed in an off-site 13,000 sq. ft. warehouse. Our artifacts are displayed in rotating exhibits at the Museum and are often loaned to other Museums and institutions for exhibit purposes.
Watch MOAH’s Board President, Jim Wall, share a fun overview of a few of the collectors who help make MOAH what it is today!
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The Museum Collection
The Museum of American Heritage preserves and presents the evolution of American invention. We collect, conserve and exhibit the wonderfully ingenious electrical and mechanical devices that have developed over the last two centuries.
MOAH is very excited to bring our collection online. Some of the photos in our database are over 20 years old and are in the process of being re-done. If you would like to further support this effort, please consider donating to MOAH ONLINE or by MAIL.
The Museum's collection is loaned out to various accredited Museums. Contact MAIL@MOAH.ORG for more information.
Helpful Notes for Navigating the Collection:
Click on the Search our Collection button above and start viewing MOAH’s collection!
You can skim through current exhibits and collectors, or you can scroll down to the bottom and click “EXPLORE THE ENTIRE COLLECTION.”
Looking for something in particular? Enter a few keywords into the search bar.
Have questions about MOAH’s collection? Please contact Zoe at zoe@moah.org.
