By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
The Amelia Earhart Hangar Museum in Atchison has been ranked by USA Today readers as one of the best new museums in the nation.
Out of 20 museums nationwide, the Amelia Earhart Hangar Museum came in at number four on the list of 2025 Top 10 History New Museums.
Executive Director Mindi Love Pendergraft says it’s particularly exciting to be on the list because the museum is one of the newest, and one of the smaller museums.
“We’re very excited by it, there’s so many wonderful museums on that list, many which I’ve been to, so just to be on the list with them at all is really phenomenal, but to be ranked number four in the top five is just incredible,” Pendergraft tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. “We’re very, very excited by it.”
It’s not the first honor received by the museum. In 2023, it was named one of the most anticipated openings by Smithsonian Magazine, and last year was ranked number four by USA Today in the Best New Museum category.
Pendergraft says it’s humbling and rewarding to see the acknowledgement of all the hard work in the creation of the museum
“You know the goal was always to bring to light the story, Amelia’s story, in her hometown,” Pendergraft says.
Pendergraft says it was also important to accentuate and bring STEM learning opportunities for the community.
“But it’s just really rewarding, the number of years of work to put this museum together has been incredible, it really is from the ground up,” Pendergraft explains. “It started the airplane, and the foundation then built a hangar museum out at the Atchison airport.”
The museum is centered around Amelia’s plane, named “Muriel, the world’s last remaining Lockheed Electra 10-E. Named after Earhart’s younger sister, “Muriel” is identical to the plane Earhart flew on her final flight around the world.
Pendergraft says since the museum opened in 2023, it has seen several visitors from around the world.
“We’ve had visitors from every state in the nation, at least 25 to 30 countries people from those countries have been here, we had amazing support from funders nationally in the aviation industry, locally here in Atchison,” Pendergraft says. “So, we’ve really been able to build a destination museum to celebrate Amelia and worldwide people are coming to visit us here in Atchison.”
The museum is one of the newest on the list, as well as the most rural. It ranks underneath the Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh and the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center and Cincinnati History Museum, both in Cincinnati.
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