Boca Raton Museum of Art

Deeply rooted in the history of its city, the Boca Raton Museum of Art exemplifies the cultural impact and "ripple effect" of the arts in small towns across America. In Boca Raton, the Museum's roots reach back to the late 1940s, when a group of socially active women came together to form the town's first organization, a civic club, with the goal to build a small library. Two library board members, philanthropist Hildegarde Schine and socialite Roberta MacSpadden had been appointed to organize an Open House. They met in the 1920s Town Hall, where an estimated 1,000 people flooded the Library Open House, which included an exhibition of paintings, borrowed from friends and loaned by galleries from Palm Beach to Miami. There and then, the Library Association decided they should form an organization to further this interest in the fine arts. In 1950, The Art Guild of Boca Raton was born.

Credits and Sources:

Information courtesy of the Florida Association of Museums. This project received financial assistance from VISIT FLORIDA