For Mike Lopez, the small 82nd Airborne Division War Memorial Museum at Fort Bragg is a cornerstone of the military unit he once served with. But he worries it may not remain there much longer.
In June, the Army announced plans to consolidate its current 41 museums down to just 12. (The plan had been in the works for months and was unrelated to other government cuts from the Department of Government Efficiency, according to previous reporting.)
The Army has not publicly confirmed which museums will be closed. But Lopez, who serves on the board of the nonprofit 82nd Airborne Division Historical Society, said he heard from various sources that the museum would be among those shuttered.
The nonprofit that supports the museum decided to take action.
“I just finally said, ‘Look, we need to go public, because that’s our only recourse to fight this,’” Lopez said.
The historical society is now engaged in a letter-writing campaign to federal elected officials and has put up billboards near Fort Bragg, trying to pressure the Army to keep it open.
The U.S. House included language in its military policy and spending bill, passed Sept. 10, that would require Congressional notification before closing an Army museum. The historical society is now trying to gather support to keep that provision as the legislation moves to the Senate.
In June, Stars and Stripes listed the 82nd Airborne Museum as among those slated to close, citing information that had leaked online. But an article published the same day in Task and Purpose was less clear, suggesting Fort Bragg — which currently also houses the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Museum — would keep at least one museum.
The Army Museum Enterprise oversees the 82nd Airborne Museum and the Airborne and Special Forces Museum, which is located off the installation in downtown Fayetteville. The JFK Special Warfare Museum operates separately and is not a candidate for closure.
The museum plan is not finalized, according to F. Lee Reynolds, spokesperson for the Center for Military History, which oversees the Army Museum Enterprise.
But a staffer for Sen. Thom Tillis told Lopez on Aug. 11 that his office is “actively working” on a solution to the potential closure, according to information Lopez shared with CityView.
That same day, Devin Heath, the president and CEO of DistiNCtly Fayetteville, sent out a memo asking “tourism stakeholders” to contact elected officials in support of the museum. These included a range of local businesses, including hotels, restaurants and more, Heath told CityView.
“Folks who are traveling and want to visit that museum stay in our hotels and they eat in our restaurants and they spend money in our economy,” Heath said. “Closing the 82nd Airborne Museum would have an adverse effect on that.”
The offices of Sen. Tillis, Ted Budd and Rep. Richard Hudson — all listed in the memo as elected officials to contact about the closing — did not respond to multiple requests for comment from CityView. Heath said he got a positive response from state and local officials but had not yet heard from any federal officials.
Museum not “reaching their fullest potential”
The 82nd Airborne Museum is a stop during orientation for every new soldier in the division, which has about 20,000 members. It is where every battalion change of command is held, Lopez said.
The museum’s main gallery includes exhibits on division deployments, plus a theater and gift shop. Back rooms hold about 600 feet of shelving full of archives and a weapons vault.
Outside are memorials to fallen soldiers, from the founding of the division in 1917 to the Global War on Terror. One commemorates the several hundred soldiers who have died in training accidents. Nearby are examples of the kinds of aircraft that paratroopers have leapt from, starting with designs from the 1930s.
Lopez, a retired colonel, served in the Army from 1988 to 2018, including four combat tours with the 82nd Airborne. When he and his wife decided to settle in Fayetteville after his retirement, Lopez began volunteering with the museum.
“I wanted to be around paratroopers,” Lopez said. “I want to be around that energy, that young, motivated energy.”
When the Army’s Center for Military History announced the museum consolidations back in June, it said that “a substantial maintenance backlog and insufficient staffing prevent our museums from reaching their fullest potential as educational and historical resources.”
Lopez questions how that logic applies to the 82nd Airborne Museum, which is funded from at least three different pools of money.
The buildings — including the main museum constructed in 1957 and a newer annex — were built with privately raised funds. The museum is 14,000 square feet on seven acres of land.
Maintenance and utilities are covered by the command at Fort Bragg that oversees all the other buildings, and is separate from the Center for Military History. The Army owns the archives and artifacts, but the historical society funds informational panels, donates to the museum and holds special events throughout the year, Lopez said.
Museum Director John Aarsen said its baseline budget from the Center for Military History is $482,000, most of which covers salaries and benefits for himself and two other civilian employees. This year, the actual funding was less than that — around $400,000. Lopez said the historical society contributed about $30,000 to the museum in 2024.
Aarsen was unable to comment on the proposal to close the museum but did share the official Army comment in an email, which again highlighted concerns about understaffing and the ability to protect and maintain artifacts.
“The future Army Museum Enterprise is designed to best support Soldier training and public education within our available budget and professional staff,” the statement reads. “The consolidation plan ensures the widest possible access to the highest quality museums within available Army resources.”
Artifacts from closed facilities could be transferred to another museum, stored or in some cases given to a local Army installation, the Center for Military History’s spokesperson said. Some artifacts might also be removed from the collection if they are duplicates or in poor condition.
The final list of museums to be closed or consolidated will be approved by the Secretary of the Army. Neither the Center for Military History or the Army Museum Enterprise could provide a timeline of when it will be announced.
For Fort Bragg and beyond
On average 46,000 people visit the museum every year, Aarsen said, about half of whom are service members. The worst year for attendance was not during COVID, but during a year when nearly the entire division was deployed, he said.
That number is small compared to, say, the Raleigh North Carolina Museum of History, which saw 355,000 visitors in 2023. But it makes it the 8th most-visited Army museum, according to Aarsen.
The museum’s focus is on the soldiers of the 82nd Airborne and their families. That can include researching World War II operations for the division commander, training for soldiers and resources for civilian family members.
“A lot of our exhibits are done in a way that facilitates the soldier talking to their family, their friends, their neighbors and their parents about what their experience was overseas,” Aarsen said.
Credit: U.S. Army Sgt. Jessica Nassirian / 22nd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment
The museum also hosts community-centered events geared at the families of soldiers, including a visit with Santa Claus, an Easter egg hunt and an airplane-turned-haunted house.
For Lopez, having soldiers see the records of their predecessors in the division and even hold the weapons they carried is an important training tool.
“I would say all divisions need to keep their museums, because when we send these young kids out somewhere, we expect them … to do nothing illegal or immoral, right?” Lopez said. “How do you know what that looks like, unless you have history lessons to draw on?”