Museum Victoria is an organisation which operates three major state-owned museum

Museum

A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...

s in Melbourne

Melbourne

Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

, Victoria

Victoria (Australia)

Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

; these are: the Melbourne Museum

Melbourne Museum

Melbourne Museum is located in the Carlton Gardens in Melbourne, Australia, adjacent the Royal Exhibition Building.It is the largest museum in the Southern Hemisphere, and is a venue of Museum Victoria, which also operates the Immigration Museum and Scienceworks Museum.The museum has seven main...

, the Immigration Museum and Scienceworks

Scienceworks Museum (Melbourne)

Scienceworks is a world renowned science museum in Melbourne, Australia. It is a venue of Museum Victoria which administers the cultural and scientific collections of the State of Victoria...

. It also manages the Royal Exhibition Building

Royal Exhibition Building

The Royal Exhibition Building is a World Heritage Site-listed building in Melbourne, Australia, completed in 1880. It is located at 9 Nicholson Street in the Carlton Gardens, flanked by Victoria, Nicholson, Carlton and Rathdowne Streets, at the north-eastern edge of the central business district...

 and a storage facility in Melbourne's City of Moreland

City of Moreland

The City of Moreland is a Local Government Area located within the metropolitan area of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It comprises the inner northern suburbs between 4 and 10 kilometres from the Melbourne city centre....

.

Museum Victoria is the caretaker of the body of Phar Lap

Phar Lap

Phar Lap was a champion Thoroughbred racehorse whose achievements captured the public's imagination during the early years of the Great Depression. Foaled in New Zealand, he was trained and raced in Australia. Phar Lap dominated Australian racing during a distinguished career, winning a Melbourne...

, Australia's most famous race horse. Phar Lap's skeleton is housed at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is the national museum and art gallery of New Zealand, located in Wellington. It is branded and commonly known as Te Papa and Our Place; "Te Papa Tongarewa" is broadly translatable as "the place of treasures of this land".The museum's principles...

 and his heart is kept at the National Museum of Australia

National Museum of Australia

The National Museum of Australia was formally established by the National Museum of Australia Act 1980. The National Museum preserves and interprets Australia's social history, exploring the key issues, people and events that have shaped the nation....

.

History

The museum traces its history back to the establishment of the National Museum of Victoria in 1854 under the directorship of Frederick McCoy

Frederick McCoy

Sir Frederick McCoy, KCMG, FRS was an Irish palaeontologist and museum administrator, active in Australia.-Early life:McCoy was the son of Dr Simon McCoy, M.D. and was born in Dublin; some sources have his year of birth as 1823, but 1817 is the most likely...

. It was founded in its current form under the Australian Museums Act (1983). The collections of around 16 million objects cover Indigenous

Indigenous Australians

Indigenous Australians are the original inhabitants of the Australian continent and nearby islands. The Aboriginal Indigenous Australians migrated from the Indian continent around 75,000 to 100,000 years ago....

 items, science

Science

Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

, history

History

History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...

 and technology

Technology

Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...

.

Significant events in the Museum's history include:

• 1854 - founding of the Museum of Natural and Economic Geology with William Blandowski
  William Blandowski
  Wilhelm Blandowski born Johan Wilhelm Theodor Ludwig von Blandowski January 21, 1822 died December 18, 1878, a German zoologist and mining engineer, was born in Gleiwitz, Upper Silesia, Kingdom of Prussia ....
  
   as Government Zoologist
• 1856 - collections moved to the University of Melbourne
  University of Melbourne
  The University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
  
   by Frederick McCoy
  Frederick McCoy
  Sir Frederick McCoy, KCMG, FRS was an Irish palaeontologist and museum administrator, active in Australia.-Early life:McCoy was the son of Dr Simon McCoy, M.D. and was born in Dublin; some sources have his year of birth as 1823, but 1817 is the most likely...
  
  
• 1858 - McCoy appointed first director of the National Museum of Victoria
• 1870 - Industrial and Technological Museum opened
• 1899 - National Museum moved to Swanston Street, Melbourne
• 1945 - Industrial and Technology Museum renamed Museum of Applied Science
• 1961 - Museum of Applied Science renamed Institute of Applied Science
• 1971 - Institute of Applied Science renamed Science Museum of Victoria
• 1983 - National Museum of Victoria and Science Museum of Victoria amalgamated to form the Museum of Victoria
• 1992 - Scienceworks Museum (Melbourne)
  Scienceworks Museum (Melbourne)
  Scienceworks is a world renowned science museum in Melbourne, Australia. It is a venue of Museum Victoria which administers the cultural and scientific collections of the State of Victoria...
  
   opened
• 1997 - Swanston Street campus closed
• 1998 - Museum of Victoria renamed Museum Victoria. Immigration Museum and Hellenic Antiquities Museum opened.
• 2000 - Melbourne Museum
  Melbourne Museum
  Melbourne Museum is located in the Carlton Gardens in Melbourne, Australia, adjacent the Royal Exhibition Building.It is the largest museum in the Southern Hemisphere, and is a venue of Museum Victoria, which also operates the Immigration Museum and Scienceworks Museum.The museum has seven main...
  
   at Carlton Gardens opened.

Administration

The present Chief Executive Officer of Museum Victoria is Dr J. Patrick Greene

J. Patrick Greene

Dr. J. Patrick Greene OBE, PhD, is an archaeologist and a museum director.-Biography:Greene was appointed in 1971 to conduct an exploratory excavation at Norton Priory near Runcorn in Cheshire, England...

.

Former Museum directors include:

• 1858 - Frederick McCoy
  Frederick McCoy
  Sir Frederick McCoy, KCMG, FRS was an Irish palaeontologist and museum administrator, active in Australia.-Early life:McCoy was the son of Dr Simon McCoy, M.D. and was born in Dublin; some sources have his year of birth as 1823, but 1817 is the most likely...
  
  
• 1899 - Walter Baldwin Spencer
  Walter Baldwin Spencer
  Sir Walter Baldwin Spencer KCMG was a British-Australian biologist and anthropologist.Baldwin was born in Stretford, Lancashire. His father, Reuben Spencer, who had come from Derbyshire in his youth, obtained a position with Rylands and Sons, cotton manufacturers, and rose to be chairman of its...
  
  
• 1928 - James A. Kershaw
• 1931 - Daniel J. Mahony
• 1957 - Charles. W. Brazenor
• 1962 - John McNally
• 1979 - Barry Wilson
• 1984 - Robert Edwards
• 1990 - Graham Morris
• 1998 - George F. MacDonald
  George F. MacDonald
  George F. MacDonald is a Canadian anthropologist and museum director who pioneered archaeological and ethnohistorical research on the Tsimshian and Gitksan and was the director of the Canadian Museum of Civilization from 1983 to 1998....
  
  

See also

• Melbourne Museum
  Melbourne Museum
  Melbourne Museum is located in the Carlton Gardens in Melbourne, Australia, adjacent the Royal Exhibition Building.It is the largest museum in the Southern Hemisphere, and is a venue of Museum Victoria, which also operates the Immigration Museum and Scienceworks Museum.The museum has seven main...
  
  
• Immigration Museum
• Scienceworks
  Scienceworks Museum (Melbourne)
  Scienceworks is a world renowned science museum in Melbourne, Australia. It is a venue of Museum Victoria which administers the cultural and scientific collections of the State of Victoria...
  
  
• Royal Exhibition Building
  Royal Exhibition Building
  The Royal Exhibition Building is a World Heritage Site-listed building in Melbourne, Australia, completed in 1880. It is located at 9 Nicholson Street in the Carlton Gardens, flanked by Victoria, Nicholson, Carlton and Rathdowne Streets, at the north-eastern edge of the central business district...