Museum of Russian Culture,
San Francisco

The Museum was established in 1948 at the Russian Center in San Francisco and incorporated in 1953 as an independent cultural non-profit corporation tax-exempt under the laws of the State of California and the United States. The aims of the Museum are:

• To promote Russian culture and collect materials about its influence on American culture.
• To collect and safeguard all types of historical materials, memorials, books, newspapers and magazines, including governmental, public and private archives and libraries, containing information on the activities of Russian emigrants all over the world, and on their lives before the revolution of 1917.
• To collect and safeguard materials about Americans of Russian descent who made significant contributions to American culture, technology, or society.
• To collect and safeguard materials about the history, activities, and contributions of Russians, the Russian American Community, and various Russian-American organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area and the West Coast.
• To make these materials available to persons conducting research in Russian history or culture.
• To establish exchange of materials and participate in joint exhibitions, research projects, etc., with similar educational and cultural organizations.
• To maintain the Exhibition Hall open to the public, free of charge. To provide exhibits with written explanations in Russian and English languages.

The Museum is staffed entirely by volunteers interested in Russian culture. The majority of volunteers are fluent in Russian and English languages.

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Please click here to see the museum archives.

The Museum consists of the following departments:

• Exhibition Hall
• Archival Library, which contains thousands of books published in pre-revolutionary Russia and by Russian emigrants, mostly in the Russian language. Some are very limited editions
• Periodicals Department with a collection of Russian newspapers and magazines published all over the world by Russian emigrants
• Archives consisting of:
  • Materials on the Russian revolution and civil war, especially in Siberia and Far East
  • Materials on the Russo-Japanese War and the First World War
  • The history of Russian emigration (archives of various organizations and societies)
  • Personal archives of prominent émigrés and of prominent Russian Americans
  • Memoirs
  • Documents of the Russian Orthodox Mission in Peking, China
  • Documents relating to the Far Eastern Railroad in Manchuria
  • Materials pertaining to the lives of Russian emigrants all over the world
  • Materials on the life of the Imperial Family, including their last days in Siberia
  • Materials pertaining to life in Russia before the revolution

The Museum of Russian Culture is on the third floor of the Russian Center Building, located at 2450 Sutter Street, San Francisco, California 94115 (map).

The Museum is open 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Admission is free.

Mailing address:

Telephone: +1-415-921-4082

E-mail address: letom@att.net

Russian Center of San Francisco is an umbrella organization that preserves and promotes Russian culture in San Francisco Bay Area. The Museum is one of its members.

Fort Ross Interpretive Association studies and preserves the cultural heritage of Fort Ross, a 19th-century Russian settlement in Northern California.