East India Marine Hall
Peabody Essex Museum

The venerable granite façade of the East India Marine Hall, erected in 1825, is the nucleus of the Peabody Essex Museum, the oldest continually operating museum in the United States. A society of well-traveled ship captains founded the museum in 1799 with the aim of exhibiting wonders collected from around the world. Since then, the institution has grown to encompass more than a million objects. For over two hundred years, visitors to Salem have discovered treasures of the city’s history here. In 1992, the two direct predecessors of the museum, The Peabody Museum of Salem and The Essex Institute, merged their collections of art, history, and science to form a museum with a global focus and presence. The Salem campus preserves more than 20 historic buildings, including Yin Yu Tang, an 1800s home transplanted from Anhui province in eastern China, and the Ropes Mansion, a storied Georgian home with a charming garden on Essex Street.