Welcome to the Will Rogers Memorial Museum
Route 66 carries many names. It is the Mother Road, the Main Street of America, the road of migration and freedom and nostalgia. But in Oklahoma, it carries one name above all others: the Will Rogers Highway. Named in honor of the state’s most beloved son, a Cherokee-heritage cowboy who became the most famous entertainer in the world in the 1920s and 1930s, the highway’s Oklahoma designation is a tribute to a man whose humor, humanity, and unflinching plain-spokenness made him a beloved figure to Americans of every background and political persuasion. At 1720 West Will Rogers Boulevard in Claremore, Oklahoma, the Will Rogers Memorial Museum tells the full story of this extraordinary life in twelve galleries, a landmark limestone building, a world-class research library, and a sunken garden where Will Rogers and his family rest overlooking the rolling Oklahoma hills he called home. For any traveler on the Mother Road through Oklahoma, a stop at the Will Rogers Memorial Museum is not optional — it is essential.
Who Was Will Rogers?
Oklahoma’s Favorite Son
William Penn Adair Rogers was born on November 4, 1879, in the Indian Territory near present-day Oologah, Oklahoma — in the Cherokee Nation, into a family of mixed Cherokee and Scots-Irish descent. His father, Clement Vann Rogers, was a successful rancher and eventually a Cherokee senator and delegate to the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention. His mother, Mary America Schrimsher Rogers, was also of Cherokee heritage; she died when Will was ten years old, a loss that shaped his character deeply.
Young Will was, by his own admission, an indifferent student — “I studied the Fourth Reader for ten years,” he once said — but a brilliant horseman and lasso artist. His Cherokee heritage was a source of profound pride throughout his life; he famously noted that his ancestry, combined with his cowboy upbringing, made him “the ideal example of the American citizen.” The Guinness Book of World Records eventually recognized his trick roping feats: he could simultaneously throw three ropes — one around the neck of a horse, one around the horse’s rider, and one around all four legs of the horse. A restless spirit from youth, Rogers left home at 18 and spent years traveling — working cattle in Argentina, performing as the “Cherokee Kid” in Texas Jack’s Wild West Show in South Africa, touring Australia and New Zealand, and gradually finding his way toward the career that would make him famous.
From Vaudeville to the Ziegfeld Follies
Rogers’s performing career began in earnest when he returned to the United States and developed a vaudeville act featuring trick roping. His 1905 debut in New York was the beginning of a remarkable trajectory. Audiences were drawn not just to his rope work but to his casual, drawling commentary — the wry observations he delivered between tricks about politics, society, and the pretensions of the powerful. His wife Betty’s suggestion that he supplement his act with commentary on current events proved transformative. By the 1910s, Rogers had joined the Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway, where his homespun philosophy and devastating one-liners made him the show’s biggest draw season after season.
The Cowboy Philosopher: Writer, Broadcaster, Film Star
By the 1920s, Will Rogers had become a genuinely multimedia phenomenon, something unprecedented in American cultural life. He was simultaneously the country’s #1 radio personality, #1 box office movie star, most sought-after public speaker, and most-read newspaper columnist — a combination no single entertainer has matched before or since. His newspaper column ran in more than 600 newspapers daily and reached an estimated 40 million readers. He made 71 films in all: 50 silent pictures and 21 talking pictures, including They Had to See Paris, A Connecticut Yankee, and State Fair. His radio broadcasts reached audiences who had never set foot in a Ziegfeld theater. His books — beginning with The Cowboy Philosopher on the Peace Conference and The Cowboy Philosopher on Prohibition — were bestsellers. He traveled around the world three times, served as President Calvin Coolidge’s informal goodwill ambassador to Europe in 1926, and wrote more than 4,000 nationally syndicated newspaper columns across his career.
Rogers’s political humor was unique in its bipartisan embrace: he skewered Democrats and Republicans with equal affection, earning the trust and laughter of Americans across the political spectrum. “Every time Congress makes a joke it’s law,” he famously observed, “and every time they make a law it’s a joke.” His philosophy was summarized in his most famous line, which he ordered inscribed on his own epitaph: “I never met a man I didn’t like.” At the height of his fame in the mid-1930s, he was the highest-paid performer in Hollywood and arguably the most famous person in the world.
The Will Rogers Highway
In 1926, the same year Will Rogers served as goodwill ambassador to Europe on behalf of President Coolidge, the new federal highway system was established — including U.S. Highway 66 through Oklahoma, Rogers’s home state. In the early 1930s, as Rogers’s national fame reached its peak, there were growing calls to rename Highway 66 in his honor. When Rogers was killed in an airplane crash near Barrow, Alaska on August 15, 1935 — traveling with aviation pioneer Wiley Post on what was to be an exploratory flight — the outpouring of national grief accelerated those efforts. Later that year, the U.S. Highway Association formally designated Route 66 as the Will Rogers Highway, a name that endures to this day. A commemorative plaque honoring the designation stands at the western terminus of Route 66 in Santa Monica, California, at the end of the road named for an Oklahoma cowboy who never stopped moving.
Death and National Mourning
The news of Will Rogers’s death on August 15, 1935 produced a wave of national grief comparable to few events in American public life before or since. Rogers and Wiley Post — the first pilot to fly solo around the world — were killed when their small floatplane crashed on takeoff from a lagoon near Barrow, Alaska. Rogers was 55 years old and at the absolute height of his fame and influence. A period of national mourning followed. Rogers was initially buried in California, but his body was later moved to Claremore to rest in the tomb that would be built in his honor on the Oklahoma land he had loved.
The Will Rogers Memorial Museum
Building a Monument: 1935–1938
In the aftermath of Rogers’s death, the question of how to honor him became an urgent national conversation. With the help of his widow Betty Rogers, the Oklahoma Legislature, and thousands of individual donors from across the country, a plan took shape: a memorial museum would be built in Claremore on the very land Rogers himself had purchased in 1911 as the site for his eventual retirement home.
The Oklahoma legislature appropriated $200,000 for the construction of the museum. The original limestone building was designed by architect John Duncan Forsyth. Groundbreaking occurred on April 21, 1938, with Will’s sister Sallie Rogers McSpadden turning the first spadeful of earth. Construction was completed November 4, 1938 — what would have been Rogers’s 59th birthday — and the museum opened to the public on that same day. Today the museum occupies 20 acres of land overlooking Claremore and Rogers State University, managed by the Oklahoma Historical Society since 2016.
The Building and the Grounds
The original 15,000-square-foot limestone building was expanded in 1983 with an 11,000-square-foot addition, bringing the total to approximately 19,000 square feet and adding a theater, a larger gift shop, expanded archival offices, and more spacious gallery display space. The result is a beautifully proportioned, classically dignified institution that fits naturally into the Oklahoma landscape of rolling hills and open sky.
The museum’s grounds are equally compelling. The 20-acre property features meticulously maintained green spaces, mature trees, and gardens that provide a peaceful, contemplative setting for a visit that is as much emotional as intellectual. The sunken garden on the grounds is where Will Rogers, his wife Betty (1879–1944), and several family members are interred, in a setting of remarkable natural beauty overlooking the Tiawah Valley and the city of Claremore below.
Inside the Museum: Twelve Galleries of a Life Fully Lived
The Rotunda and the Jo Davidson Sculpture
Visitors entering the Will Rogers Memorial Museum are greeted immediately by one of the building’s most celebrated features: the rotunda, which houses a famous bronze sculpture of Will Rogers by celebrated artist Jo Davidson. Davidson was among the most renowned portrait sculptors of the 20th century, known for his life-size bronze figures of world leaders and cultural icons. His sculpture of Rogers — capturing the cowboy-philosopher in characteristic relaxed pose, lariat in hand, wry expression intact — is the ideal introduction to the man whose life the museum commemorates. The sculpture’s pedestal is inscribed with Rogers’s most famous words: “…I never met a man I didn’t like.”
The Twelve Galleries
The museum’s 12 galleries trace the arc of Rogers’s life and career with remarkable breadth and depth, organized thematically to explore each dimension of his extraordinary public and private existence. Visitors move through galleries dedicated to his Cherokee heritage and Oklahoma upbringing, his years as a trick roper in Wild West shows and vaudeville, his Broadway career in the Ziegfeld Follies, his transition to film (with exhibits covering both his silent pictures and his talking films), his newspaper column and radio career, his political commentary and relationships with presidents, his philanthropy and humanitarian work during the Depression, and his final years at the height of his fame.
Throughout the galleries, the collections include an extraordinary range of artifacts: saddles from Rogers’s personal collection, original manuscripts and letters, rare photographs documenting his career from Wild West shows to Hollywood, movie posters and film memorabilia, original newspaper columns and radio scripts, and personal items that bring the human scale of his life into vivid relief. The museum’s collection also includes significant fine art, with original works by Charles Russell, Jo Davidson, Electra Waggoner, Wayne Cooper, Charles Banks Wilson, and Count Tamburini — artists who documented and celebrated Rogers during his lifetime.
The Theater
One of the museum’s most popular features is its theater, where visitors can watch a rotating selection of Will Rogers’s films, listen to recordings of his radio broadcasts, and experience his humor and wisdom in the medium he originally intended. Rogers’s screen presence — his casual delivery, his genial self-deprecation, his ability to seem both unpretentious and deeply wise — comes alive in the theater in a way that photographs and display cases cannot fully replicate. The theater typically offers a selection of six films daily, with visitors able to choose their preferred title at the kiosk. Classic films like State Fair, A Connecticut Yankee, and They Had to See Paris are among those regularly screened.
The Children’s Museum
For younger visitors, the hands-on Children’s Museum within the complex offers interactive activities and age-appropriate exhibits designed to bring Will Rogers’s story to life for new generations. The children’s area has been a consistently praised feature of the museum, making it an excellent destination for families traveling Route 66.
The Research Library and Archives
Scholars and researchers will find the 2,400-square-foot research library and archives an invaluable resource. The library houses Will Rogers’s complete writings — all of his newspaper columns, radio scripts, books, letters, and manuscripts — as well as the world’s largest collection of Rogers-related materials. This is not merely a museum in the display-and-gift-shop sense; it is a genuine research institution preserving the full documentary record of one of the 20th century’s most significant American public figures. The research library is available to scholars by appointment.
The Audio Tour
An enhanced audio tour, accessible via QR codes throughout the galleries, allows visitors to select additional context and storytelling for each exhibit area using their smartphones. The tour adds significant depth to the gallery experience and is particularly recommended for those who want to understand not just the facts of Rogers’s life but the cultural and historical context that made his voice so consequential.
The Sunken Garden and the Tomb of Will Rogers
Outside the museum building, on the beautifully maintained 20-acre grounds, the sunken garden holds the tomb of Will Rogers alongside those of his wife Betty and several family members. Rogers was initially buried in California, but his remains were later moved to Claremore — to the land he had purchased in 1911 with the intention of building his retirement home, land that instead became his permanent resting place.
The tomb is set in a garden of flowers and trees, overlooking the Tiawah Valley and Rogers State University below, with open Oklahoma sky above. The stone beside the grave carries the inscription Rogers himself is said to have chosen: “If you live life right, death is a joke as far as fear is concerned.” A statue of Rogers on horseback in full cowboy attire stands on a pedestal overlooking the city. Visiting the sunken garden — quiet, beautifully tended, and genuinely moving — is one of the most memorable experiences a traveler can have anywhere on the Will Rogers Highway.
Will Rogers and Route 66: The Highway Bears His Name
The connection between Will Rogers and Route 66 is not coincidental — it is foundational. Route 66 was commissioned in 1926, the same year Rogers was serving as President Coolidge’s goodwill ambassador in Europe. The highway runs through Oklahoma, the state that produced him. And when Rogers died in 1935, the route he had crossed countless times on his journeys between Oklahoma and the coasts was named the Will Rogers Highway in his honor.
That name carries weight on Route 66 through Oklahoma. The state that holds more drivable miles of original Route 66 than any other proudly calls its stretch of the Mother Road the Will Rogers Highway, and the memorial museum in Claremore is the emotional anchor of that identity. Travelers who drive the Oklahoma corridor of Route 66 — from the Kansas border in the northeast through Claremore, Catoosa, and Tulsa toward Oklahoma City and beyond — are driving on the road that bears his name, and the museum is the place to understand what that name means.
What Else to See in Claremore
J.M. Davis Arms & Historical Museum
Located on the original stretch of Route 66 in Claremore, the J.M. Davis Arms & Historical Museum houses a remarkable collection of more than 20,000 firearms spanning centuries of American and world history, along with World War I posters, antique saddles, and an outlaw section featuring weapons associated with notorious figures including Pretty Boy Floyd and Pancho Villa. It is one of the largest privately assembled gun collections ever put on public display.
Will Rogers Birthplace Ranch
Just north of Claremore in Oologah lies Will Rogers Birthplace Ranch, preserved by the Oklahoma Historical Society as a companion site to the Memorial Museum. The ranch features the original “White House on the Verdigris River” — the home where Rogers was born — along with longhorn cattle, horses, and exhibits on his early life in Indian Territory. A visit to the birthplace ranch combined with the Memorial Museum provides the most complete possible picture of Will Rogers’s Oklahoma roots.
Lynn Riggs Memorial and the Oklahoma! Connection
Claremore is also home to the Lynn Riggs Memorial, honoring another of the city’s famous native sons. Lynn Riggs wrote “Green Grow the Lilacs,” the play that Rodgers and Hammerstein adapted into the groundbreaking 1943 Broadway musical Oklahoma! The Claremore Museum of History houses exhibits on Riggs, including the original “surrey with the fringe on top” and other props and materials from the musical’s production history.
Will Rogers Downs
Horse racing has been a beloved Oklahoma tradition, and Will Rogers Downs in Claremore honors the great Oklahoman’s love of horses with live racing events through the year. The venue also features simulcast racing and casino games.
Continuing Your Route 66 Journey from Claremore
Claremore sits on the northeastern Oklahoma segment of Route 66 in Oklahoma, between the Kansas state line and Tulsa. Just southwest of Claremore, travelers reach Catoosa, Oklahoma — home of the iconic Blue Whale of Catoosa, the 80-foot smiling fiberglass whale that is one of Route 66’s most joyful and universally beloved roadside landmarks. From Catoosa, the road continues west through Tulsa — Oklahoma’s second city, with its spectacular art deco architecture, neon signs, and deep Route 66 heritage. Continuing west through central Oklahoma leads to Oklahoma City, then south and west through Stroud — home of the Rock Cafe, the diner that inspired Pixar’s Cars — and onward to the Round Barn in Arcadia. For the full picture of Oklahoma’s 432-mile Route 66 corridor, the Oklahoma Route 66 Museum in Clinton offers one of the most comprehensive and immersive Route 66 museum experiences in the country.
Climate and the Best Time to Visit
Claremore and northeastern Oklahoma experience a humid subtropical climate with four distinct seasons. Spring (March–May) and fall (September–November) offer the most comfortable conditions for Route 66 travel through the region — mild temperatures, lower humidity, and the expansive, dramatic sky of the Oklahoma hills at their most beautiful. Summer is hot and humid, with temperatures regularly reaching the 90s°F; the museum’s air-conditioned galleries make it an ideal refuge during peak summer heat. Spring is Oklahoma’s severe weather season, so travelers should monitor forecasts from late March through June.
Practical Tips for Visiting the Will Rogers Memorial Museum
- Address: 1720 West Will Rogers Boulevard, Claremore, Oklahoma 74017
- Phone: (918) 341-0719
- Website: willrogers.com
- Hours: Wednesday–Sunday 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Closed Monday and Tuesday, and closed Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. Hours may vary seasonally; verify before visiting.
- Admission: Adults $10, Seniors (62+) $8, Military (with ID) FREE, Children 6–18 $5, Children under 6 FREE.
- Parking: Free parking is available at the museum entrance.
- Allow enough time: Budget a minimum of 90 minutes; 2–3 hours is recommended if you want to watch a film in the theater and explore the grounds and tomb. With the children’s museum, families may want even longer.
- Audio tour: Available via QR codes throughout the galleries on your smartphone. Highly recommended for additional depth and storytelling context.
- Theater: Classic Will Rogers films play daily. Select your preferred film at the theater kiosk. Six options are typically available on any given day.
- Gift shop: A well-stocked museum store offers books, DVDs, art prints, Route 66 memorabilia, Native American artifacts, Western heritage items, clothing, food, toys, and other souvenirs.
- Birthplace Ranch: Combine your visit with a trip to the Will Rogers Birthplace Ranch in Oologah (approximately 12 miles north) for the full picture of Rogers’s Oklahoma origins.
- Route 66 Passport: Get your Oklahoma Route 66 passport stamped at the museum store. Passport books are also available for purchase if you don’t already have one.
Final Thoughts: Why the Will Rogers Memorial Matters to Route 66
Route 66 is the Will Rogers Highway because Will Rogers was, in his time, the living embodiment of everything the road represented: the belief in movement, in the essential goodness of ordinary people, in the healing power of laughter, in the democratic ideal that a Cherokee cowboy from Indian Territory could become the voice of a nation. His humility was genuine, his wit was sharp, and his love for the people he traveled among — wherever the road took him — was the foundation of everything he said and did.
The Will Rogers Memorial Museum in Claremore is one of the most genuinely important stops anywhere on the Mother Road — not just as a Route 66 attraction, but as a place where a remarkable American life is preserved with the care and respect it deserves. Standing in the sunken garden as the Oklahoma afternoon light plays across the Tiawah Valley, it is easy to understand why Will Rogers bought this land in 1911. It is also easy to understand why the road named for him stretches across the state he loved, carrying travelers on the same journey he made again and again, always finding something worth saying about the people he met along the way.
Nearby Route 66 Highlights
- Blue Whale of Catoosa — The 80-foot smiling fiberglass whale just southwest of Claremore, one of Route 66’s most beloved roadside icons.
- Catoosa, Oklahoma — Home of the Blue Whale and a charming Route 66 community just west of Claremore on the Mother Road.
- Tulsa on Route 66 — Art deco architecture, neon signs, and the full Route 66 experience in Oklahoma’s second city.
- Oklahoma City on Route 66 — The state capital and a Route 66 hub with the Milk Bottle Grocery, the Lake Overholser Bridge, and miles of vintage Mother Road charm.
- Rock Cafe, Stroud — The legendary Route 66 diner that inspired Pixar’s Cars, in the heart of central Oklahoma.
- Round Barn, Arcadia — The 1898 Route 66 landmark built from Kellyville sandstone, one of the Mother Road’s most photographed structures.
- Oklahoma Route 66 Museum, Clinton — One of the finest Route 66 museums in the country, with decade-by-decade immersive exhibits on the Mother Road’s full history.
- Route 66 in Oklahoma — Complete Guide — The definitive guide to Oklahoma’s 432-mile Route 66 corridor, the state with more drivable original highway miles than any other.
