University of Kansas Natural History Museum

The University of Kansas Natural History Museum in Dyche Hall is one of the great natural history collections of the Great Plains, housed in a Victorian building on the campus hill. The main hall's panoramic diorama of mounted animals in natural poses — built in the 1890s — is still remarkable for its scale and ambition, even by modern standards.

The museum covers palaeontology, zoology, geology, and cultural history, with strong collections related to Kansas and the Great Plains. The mounted animals include bison, elk, bears, and many smaller species, all arranged in habitat groups. The building's exterior is worth noting too — Dyche Hall's turrets and stone facade are among the most distinctive on the KU campus.

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A story
The museum's most famous resident is "Comanche," the horse who was found as the sole US Army survivor at the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876. The horse was declared a regimental survivor, given full honours, and lived until 1891. After his death he was preserved and placed at the Natural History Museum, where he has stood on display for over a century — a somewhat unsettling but historically significant exhibit.

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