Preserving St. Paul Baptist Church was a major goal of Mary Hardy Buckner, a long-time member of the congregation. She encouraged her daughter, Cherie Buckner-Webb, to find a way to avoid its demolition.[1] Buckner-Webb established a foundation in 1996 to take ownership of the church building, but this required moving it from the land on which it sat. The group raised $120,000 to move the structure and establish a museum in it once it reached its new location.[6] The city of Boise agreed to allow the building to be moved to a spot on the outskirts of Julia Davis Park.[7] The building was relocated in 1998.[4] Local artist Cherie Lindley conserved the building's original eight stained glass windows prior to the museum's opening.[8]
The museum dates its founding to 1995,[7] making it the oldest African American history museum in the Pacific Northwest,[4] but did not open its doors until 1999.[4]
The Idaho Black History Museum focuses on African Americans in Idaho from the early 1800s to the present. The museum's permanent display, "The Invisible Idahoan: 200 Years of Blacks in Idaho", was created with the assistance of Dr. Mamie Oliver, the first African American professor at Boise State University.[4] Other exhibits contain artifacts and displays on Aurelius Buckner, the first Black athlete at Boise State University; Dorothy Buckner, African American activist who succeeded in pushing the Idaho legislation to adopt a civil rights bill in 1961; Cherie Buckner-Webb, the first Black legislator in the state of Idaho, and the history of the Ku Klux Klan's attempts to intimidate African Americans in the state.[9] The museum's collection also included a sizeable number of works of African American art. The museum's programming includes films, lectures, films, performances, and workshops.[4]
The museum's currect executive director is Phillip Thompson, Mary Hardy Buckner's great-grandson.[1] The museum suffered a significant financial crisis in 2007 that required it to lay off staff and reduce its hours[4] In 2016, the museum was vandalized when someone wrote a racial slur in the snow on the roof of the museum's storage facility.[10]
