Where you can experience the ancient and enduring Indigenous cultures of our region
Arizona State Museum (ASM) cares for the world’s largest and most comprehensive collections documenting the 13,000-year human history of the U.S. Southwest and northern Mexico. Established in 1893, ASM is the region’s oldest and largest anthropological research museum and the nation's largest and busiest state-run archaeological curation facility.
Donor support greatly enhances ASM’s ability to continue to care for its collections, create new knowledge, and share all its resources with the world in many and varied ways.
In addition to engaging university students through classroom, laboratory, and field instruction, ASM offers a full calendar of public programs sharing its expertise and collections with visitors of all ages through exhibits, school programs, lectures, hands-on activities, workshops, and travel tours.
"A gift of any size to our Annual Fund greatly enhances my ability to fund projects that are central to ASM's mission but are not funded by the state, grants, or by restricted donations. There are many. Thank you!"
– Director Patrick D. Lyons
ASM's collections contain more than 3 million catalogued objects, curated for the education, inspiration, and enjoyment of current and future generations. ASM Is the only institution in the country to have three separate collections honored as American Treasures, a fact that emphasizes the Importance of ASM's holdings to our nation's shared cultural history.
SOME OF OUR TOP PRIORITIES
Arizona State Museum Annual Fund
These funds are available to be used at the discretion of leadership at the Arizona State Museum to advance strategic goals.
The Clara Lee Tanner Endowed Professorship
This fund ensures a faculty position shared by the Arizona State Museum and the UA School of Anthropology (SoA). Headquartered at ASM with a research lab, the incumbent curator teaches through SoA, using ASM’s collections, and conducts research and publishes on the material culture of the Indigenous peoples of the U.S. Southwest and northwest Mexico.
Archaeological Curation and Research Facility
A high priority is an off-campus curation facility in Tucson. Collecting for more than a century and growing by 1,000 cubic feet per year, ASM is quickly running out of space to curate and facilitate research on archaeological collections recovered from state, county, and municipal lands in Arizona. Nothing more can be done on campus without sacrificing space currently devoted to exhibitions and public programs and, thus, harming ASM's ability to share collections with the public.
Endowment Fund for the Computerized Collections Information System (CCIS)
Curators and database managers have been working for years to migrate the content that will be available worldwide via an interactive website—information on some three million items. Once launched, it will cost about $20,000 a year for user licenses, web hosting fees, security, maintenance, and to continually add data. Contributions to the CCIS endowment fund will endure forever in the principal and help us maintain this important public service in perpetuity.