This distinguished building was an early example in Texas of the Moderne style. Designer Macon O. Carder’s model seems to be Paul P. Cret’s Folger Shakespeare Library (1932) in Washington, D.C., where trabeated forms were Cret’s interpretation of modern classicism. The heavy attic, the panels of sculpture beneath the windows, and the fluted pilasters on the central entrance pavilion allude to Cret’s building. The iconography of a cowboy and Indian carved into the walls flanking the entrance and the fauna of West Texas worked into the attic rosettes evoke a regional spirit. The museum has been expanded several times, the first in 1937. Maintained jointly by the Panhandle-Plains Historical Society and West Texas A&M University, the museum contains major collections in anthropology, paleontology, natural history, the cattle industry, Plains Indians, transportation, and fine and decorative arts.