Where is your favorite sports museum in the world? Which sports museum or exhibit did not resonate with you? Which ones should I DEFINITELY visit? Which sports museums do I HAVE to see, specifically while I am in Europe (now until March)? Or perhaps you have never seen a sports exhibit, I would love to know why. Either way- feel free to answer any or all of these questions in the comments section:
Have you ever been to a sports museum or seen a sports history exhibit of any kind? (Discuss as many as you would like)
If so:
Where did you see it- history museum? Sports museum? Other? (also include location: country and/or state)
What did you like or not like about it and why?
If not:
Why have you never seen a sports history exhibit?
Would you like to see one but you just haven’t for some reason?
Do you not like sports history, sports museums, or sports exhibits? Why?
Anything else you want to say about your experience with sports museums, exhibits, or sports as it is presented to the public?
Interpreting Sports 
Negro League Baseball Museum, Kansas City, Mo. The Negro Leagues are a forgotten part of the rich tapestry of baseball history. The museum is about so much more than baseball. It is about our history–warts and all–as Americans. Today it is unfathomable to consider the best baseball players being intentionally shut out of the game, but the NLBM places that sad reality in perfect perspective, while celebrating the achievements of these great athletes and the hardships they endured to simply play the game. For decades, stories of their athletic achievements and personalities went vastly unchronicled to the masses, and with each passing year their stories fade more and more. The museum keeps these important stories alive.
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David- thank you very much for this feedback. I actually visited this museum in May for the first time. I was struck by the importance of the topic, which led the curators to provide quite a bit of depth in the exhibit. I plan to create a post about this exhibit at some point in the next year. As you can imagine I have a long line of exhibits that I have visited but have not yet reviewed. I find your comment interesting about it being a forgotten part of baseball history. The Baseball Hall of Fame has (is) retroactively inducting Negro League players into the BHOF, which is a great step in the right direction and has heightened the awareness. But more could/should be done nation-wide to draw focus to these players and their powerful history.
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Not what you want to hear as you are in Europe, but I think the ‘Antipodes’ do sports museums/exhibitions the best.
Unlike general museums here in the UK, sport features a great deal in a number of Australian museums in particular. This is no doubt reflective of what decision-makers in each nation regard as important in terms of the national culture / psyche / identity (although I guess we’ve all that Henry VIII stuff and castles to deal with). I do feel this reflects an issue relating to a genuine history of ‘the people’ versus that of Royalty and the ‘elites’ however.
Anyway, specific exhibits / exhibitions I’ve loved: Phar Lap (the body of) at the Melbourne Museum – One hell of an animal, and looks like he’d snaffle a lump of sugar off you even today; the Test match ball allegedly tampered with by the Pakistan cricket team at the Oval in 2006 (The Oval Museum, but now withdrawn from public view) – it didn’t look in particularly bad shape to me or my mate; the Australian War Memorial’s ‘Sport and War’ exhibition (an incredible array of physical exhibits and stories relating, in the main, to POW sports in particular); the ‘Bodyline’ exhibit at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra – very funny / disturbing to watch an Aussie man in his 30s almost spit with disgust at the 75 year old footage! Finally, the Ashes urn, which was on a tour of Australia. I saw it in two locations and loved observing the Aussie cricket ‘tragics’ queuing up to see this underwhelming object.
Fav museums/tours: Melbourne Cricket Ground – all around excellence, superb tour guide. New Zealand Cricket Museum, Basin Reserve, Wellington – Opened up for gf and I and had a personalised tour from curator. What was known as the Bradman Museum was interesting, but rather remote. A few factual errors also. What was the Rugby League Museum (now sponsored) at the George Hotel in Huddersfield (gloriously amateur and understated).
Football does not float my boat in the same way, and the National Football Museum (NFM) appears to reflect the modern game (too big, and a bit flash) – some excellent exhibits, one-off exhibitions and talks however – depends on the timing of your visit. Never been to an individual club’s museum.
While I appreciate a given museum can only display so much at any one time, many important stories are overlooked in favour of the ‘orthodox’ (invented) narrative, and the MCC museum at Lord’s exemplifies this problem. Cricket as played by the vast majority of ordinary cricketers is ignored as are certain controversies. I’d suggest the NFM is infinitely superior in dealing with the ‘unsavoury’ or the ‘controversial’.
Hope that helps.
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Duncan- In fact, this is EXACTLY the type of feedback I need. I want to know what is happening all over the world in places I have yet to see but would be willing to go. I can’t be in all places all the time but exhibits are happening in all places all the time. I am also just as interested in perspectives on exhibits I have already seen (such as the Negro League Museum in the previous comment) because each visitor has their own valid perspective that speaks to personal experience and outlook. Thank you very much for your post. I welcome additional feedback such as this. I will read it over in more detail and respond accordingly.
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