View cultural artifacts—and personal stories behind them—in our core collection
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Museum of the Peace Corps Experience Announces November 10, 2026 Opening Celebration for 65 Objects That Changed the World WASHINGTON, D.C. — October 7, 2026 — The
Landmark gift launches $100,000 Museum-building challenge as Diamond Rivers Reborn—a new film returning Bill Benenson to the Brazilian landscape that helped launch his filmmaking career after Peace Corps service—premieres November
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 65 Objects That Changed the World opens November 10 at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, exploring what encounters between Americans and communities around the world
About the Exhibition What can an ordinary object tell us about the ways people change one another—and about what it means to be American? For more than six decades, Peace
Overview Peace doesn’t just happen—it’s imagined, built, and lived. Peace by Design invites visitors to examine how peace takes shape—in bold posters, in small acts of service, and in the words of poets.
Overview Ubuntu in Action: Exploring Peace Corps Service and Shared Humanity invited visitors to consider how peace is built through relationships, care, and shared responsibility. Organized by the Museum of
Donald Kilhefner Ethiopia I, 1962-1965 Unlike most Peace Corps members, as a still-closeted gay man, the most stressful—frightening and harrowing, really—part of my three-year Peace Corps experience was the 1962
How the Peace Corps helped me combine my spiritual energy and rational thinking to live a creative life Raymond GrayDominican Republic 1962-1964 I was nineteen years old in 1961 when
“The ball is a powerful tool against poverty and violence” Pele. Mike MitchellNiger 1983-1985 When I learned that I would be sent to Niger, in West Africa, a landlocked Sahelian
Returned Peace Corps Volunteers who identify as a member of a non-majority group in the USA talk about their unique Peace Corps experiences.
The future is bright! The Museum is actively exploring space options in Washington, D.C. close to the Peace Corps Park site at the foot of Capitol Hill. We imagine an experience wherein visitors explore interactive exhibits on peace education, foreign cultures, and the history of Peace Corps at the Museum paired with a park visit that fosters reflection and community. Join the Museum’s 40+ volunteers and hundreds of supporters in bringing this vision to life.
Museum of the Peace Corps Experience
PO Box 2427
Oregon City, OR 97045 USA
“For every young American who participates in the Peace Corps—who works in a foreign land—will know that he or she is sharing in the great common task of bringing to man that decent way of life, which is the foundation of freedom and a condition of peace.”
– President John F. Kennedy, March 1, 1961
The Committee for a Museum of the Peace Corps Experience is a 501(c)(3) private nonprofit organization. Tax ID: EIN # 93-1289853
The Museum is not affiliated with the U.S. Peace Corps and not acting on behalf of the U.S. Peace Corps.
Museum of the Peace Corps Experience © 2024. All Rights Reserved.
Help Us Meet the $100,000 Challenge
Bill and Laurie Benenson have made a transformative $100,000 gift to the Museum—and challenged our community to match it.
Your gift today will help us preserve Peace Corps stories, create ambitious exhibitions and programs, and build the Museum for the next generation.
Together, we can turn 100,000 into 200,000.
