High Desert Museum

Donald Kerr founded the High Desert Museum in 1982, growing it from an idea rooted in natural history into what is now a 135-acre indoor-outdoor institution south of Bend on Highway 97. The museum holds wildlife exhibits — river otters, porcupines, birds of prey — alongside collections interpreting the cultures and landscapes of the high desert. A Smithsonian Affiliate, it draws on that network for artifacts and traveling exhibits. A $40 million expansion, breaking ground in 2026, will add gallery and classroom space and renovate the long-running Indigenous Plateau exhibit "By Hand Through Memory."