Arizona Mining and Mineral Museum Ratings

The Arizona Mining and Mineral Museum is highly rated by many lists of top Phoenix museums and attractions. It is in a class or premium museums that includes the Heard Museum, the Arizona Science Center, and the Hall of Flame.

www.10best.com placed the mineral museum in second place on their list of 10 best Phoenix museums. www.azcentral.com /best/2009, www.nileguide.com, www.worldweb.com, www.yellowbot.com, and travel.aol.com also include the mineral museum in their lists of 10 best Phoenix museums.

www.greatmuseums.org includes the mineral museum on a list of 13 great museums located within the city limits of Phoenix. The 13 great museums are listed alphabetically. www.arizonavista.com and www.phoenix.about.com both include (alphabetically) the mineral museum on their lists of 20 recommended museums in the Phoenix city limits.

The mineral museum even ranks high on list of all Phoenix attractions (not just museums). www.travel-library.com lists the mineral museum in fifth place on their list of top 10 things to see in Phoenix on a short break. www.usatourist.com and www.knol.google.com both put the mineral museum in sixth place on their list of top 10 Phoenix attractions. www.tripadvisor.com placed the mineral museum in 6th place on their list of 125 attractions in metro Phoenix.

www.phoenix-arizona.com includes the mineral museum (9th) on their list of ten Phoenix attractions for the entire family. The museums unique attractions for children are also recognized by www.grandparents.com. They include the mineral museum in their list of 101 things to do in Phoenix. Even www.azteenmagazine.com included the mineral museum on their list of 36 museums in the Greater Phoenix (metropolitan) area (listed alphabetically).

On their website, the Central Arizona Museum Association boasts that the museum is “one of the largest and finest mineral museums in he Southwest”. The Arizona Heritage Traveler (www.azheritagetraveler.org) proclaims that the museum “commemorates the mining industry that helped build Arizona” … into “the country’s number one mining state with the largest value of non fuel mineral production”.

Further professional recognition was recently provided by Mining Engineering. They recognized the museum for preserving mining history in their January 210 issue, and awarded the curator, Dr. Jan Rasmussen, the GEM Award in their February 2010 issue.

The museum has also become an essential resource for K-12 earth science education and teacher training. All of this was achieved with minimal support from taxpayers (floor space and curators salary). All displays and programs are the result of donations and hundreds of thousand of volunteer hours provided by talented and dedicated supporters.

Unfortunately, these excellent ratings combined with a unique and essential role in K-12 earth science education have not deterred the Governors plans to effectively eliminate this museum and replace it with something very different and much more costly.