Vegas Day 3: Museums

For our last full day in Vegas, we decided to do something unusual for Vegas tourists, visit the museums. During our last visit to Vegas we spent half a day at the Mob Museum, something I highly recommend. It is filled with great information about mob history but also how it is related to the urbanization of Las Vegas during the first half of the twentieth century. It is located a block away from Freemont Street in the original court house which was used during the Kefauver hearings during the 1950's. However this time we decided to give a new museum a chance and also visit a popular exhibit on the Strip.

Elvis Presley, I want to meet Elvis Presley!

First we stopped by Madame Toussad's Museum of Wax at the Venetian. After several frustrating attempts to find the exhibit (it is not easily found if you are coming from the Palazzo) we finally found the exhibit. It is one of several Madam Toussad's found around the world (the original found in London) and have heard excellent reviews. For those who have never heard of this interesting woman, Anna Marie Toussad was German artist who gained international fame in the eighteenth century for her wax portraits of European royalty and celebrities such as Voltaire. She got caught up during the French Revolution and was imprisoned. She was eventually released and then employed to make death masks of those executed during the revolution. After the revolution, she left France for London where she created the exhibit that would become Madame Toussads. After her death her son and grandson would continue the exhibit and the craft. It would eventually be sold to group of businessmen that would mold it into the international exhibit that can be viewed by guests across the world.

The exhibit was a little short for the price in my opinion but I really enjoyed the exhibit. The wax figurines were incredibly detailed and lifelike. However there was some discrepancy in the quality of the wax figures. Where as some were so lifelike it was almost creepy to stand next to them, others were less detailed and lacked that life like quality. In hindsight this could have been due to the lighting, but there were definitely some that stood out in terms of excellence. This being Vegas, there were several Elvises, Bugsy Segal, and Frank Sinatra. However they were advertising a Marvel section that turned out to be just a Hulk, Spiderman, and Jessica Alba as the Invisible Woman.

Thirsty anyone?

After Madame Toussad's and short 5 minute drive away from the Strip is the National Atomic Testing Museum. This Smithsonian affiliated museum presents the fascinating and at times frightening history of atomic testing of the Nevada Testing Site north of Las Vegas. It was active between 1952 to 1992 after the U.S government abandoned the Bikini Atoll testing site due to financial and security reasons. Testing and development reached a fervor during the Cold War as the Americans fought to stay a step ahead of the Soviets. Even after new laws made atomic testing above ground illegal, underground atomic testing continued at a active rate.

How about now? 

The museum's collection presents this history in a unique way. It presents artifacts and information chronologically through the traditional exhibit model but expands itself into a social history of atomic testing by reminding visitors of what was occurring in American political and popular culture and international news through the testing site's lifespan. Social history is the school of scholarship that looks at history from the "bottom up". The museum did this by placing screens playing a series of commercials, tv and film clips, new clips, and music from the different years every time a new time period was discussed. This approach takes atomic testing out of the realm of pure scientific history and contextualizes it in the lives of everyday Americans. This also included the lives of the people who lived on the testing site. Employees worked 6 day work weeks and stayed on site. To deal with the isolation, they established bowling alleys, dance nights, and other forms of entertainment and social activity to recreate a sense of normalcy that they were missing. The museum also tackles difficult questions about the effects of atomic testing on the environment and connections to the Native people whose land was taken by the U.S government for the Nevada Testing Site.


This museum is probably my second favorite in all of Las Vegas (I'm still in love with the Mob Museum). It took atomic testing out of the realm of pure science history and made it come to life as a human history. I also appreciated that the museum was careful to take into consideration the people whose lives were negatively and profoundly affected by atomic testing and the Nevada Testing Site. It also took seriously the lives of the people who worked to keep the test site running. This included engineers, security guards, secretaries, and others whose stories are equally important to the site's history. In many of the oral histories seen at the museum, you hear differing opinions but they are each treated with respect. I recommend this museum to all Las Vegas tourists. Take a break from the Strip and take advantage of this wonderfully informative and educational museum.

This is what a happy historian looks like!