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Give the Museum of Natural History your name

Our development team is available to discuss how your name could have an ongoing impact on the Museum of Natural History.

Give your name

Located on the campus of the Â鶹ӳ»­, the Museum of Natural History holds irreplaceable specimens of plants and animals used in research, teaching, and outreach. Collections date back as far as the 1850s, and represent unique snapshots of the flora and fauna of the Great Basin and beyond. As the only museum of its kind in the state, the Museum of Natural History is a unique and important resource for understanding Â鶹ӳ»­'s natural heritage.

The museum's director and Foundation Professor Elizabeth Leger, along with her staff of faculty and graduate students, work tirelessly writing grants and seeking out funding wherever they can in order to keep the irreplaceable collection safe and available to the researchers and students who enjoy it. Endowing the museum with a name would mean all that effort could be directed back into the museum, knowing the collections were safe.

And it would help Dr. Leger sleep better at night.

Double the impact

Not just a Museum, not just a research collection—the Museum of Natural History successfully connects the two distinct audiences to create a truly unique and invaluable experience for the kindergartner and postdoc alike.

Two graduate students share some of the museum's bird specimens with visiting guests.

Real science. real community connection.

The Museum of Natural History sits at the South entrance to campus and welcomes the public to tour its eclectic collections five days a week. The museum hosts on average two K-12 class tours a week, summer camps in the summer, participates in off-campus outreach events and is packed with squealing kids holding snakes during the University’s Day at the Museum spring event. What makes the museum as a public space particularly unique is the insight into the lives and research of real working scientists who are often the tour guides or working in the background as visitor pass through.

Beth Leger holds a box of bird eggs above a drawer filled with egg specimens.

Preserving a library of irreplaceable data

Natural history collections form the foundation of basic and applied life sciences. Long-term collections provide unique information about how organisms and ecosystems change over time and space.

The meticulously maintained collections in the Museum of Natural History provide scientists with fundamental insights into species evolution and ecology which, in turn, can provide land managers and policymakers the ability to identify the regions most in need of conservation.

You can think of the museum as like a library, but it’s full of biological diversity instead of books.

Chris Feldman

Associate Museum Director and Curator of Vertebrates

Dried dead bats labeled in a drawer.

A vision for the future

Museum Director Beth Leger has an inspired vision for the future of the Museum—one a named endowment could have a huge impact on making a reality.

A graduate student helps a young boy hold a snake.

"I envision the Museum as the ground floor of the new life sciences building, something very much open to the public, as well as to University students and faculty. Our unique niche would be a museum that combines teaching, research and outreach in the same exact space. I envision research labs with working spaces behind clear windows, surrounding an atrium with exhibits (and a coffee shop, of course) so students and the public can visit and see our cool creatures and displays, but also get a birds-eye-view of the actual research and teaching that goes on at the University. I want to turn the museum inside out and put the things that are usually going on in the background into the foreground. Linking natural history research and public museum spaces would be incredible."

Learn more about the Museum of Natural History

We need your name here.

There are unending opportunities to use your name to support our faculty, students and growth in the College of Science.

Unearth the value of named faculty positions
Discover the impact of named funds and scholarships
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