Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum

The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum, named for Benjamin Banneker, Frederick Douglass, and Harriet Tubman is dedicated to preserving Maryland's African American heritage and serves as the state's official repository of African American material culture. The museum was dedicated on February 24, 1984.

The original museum was housed within the former Mount Moriah African Methodist Episcopal Church in the heart of historic Annapolis. The Victorian-Gothic structure was included in the Annapolis Historic District in 1971 and placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. The recently completed BDM addition is a four-story addition that uses the nineteenth-century brick of the church's north façade as its interior lobby wall.

With 2024 being the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Civil Rights Act (1964), the Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture (MCAAHC) and Banneker-Douglass Museum declared 2024 as “Maryland’s Year of Civil Rights” with exciting and relevant programming, exhibitions, and partnerships to commemorate the milestone year of this groundbreaking legislation.

Plan your visit to Annapolis and Anne Arundel County and explore this and other Civil Rights programming throughout 2025.

What's New?

She Speaks: Black Women Artists and the Power of Historical Memory

February 7, 2026 - January 16, 2027

The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum is proud to debut She Speaks: Black Women Artists and the Power of Historical Memory – a visionary presentation that examines the 250-year history of the United States of America through a Black Feminist lens. Curated by Martina Dodd, Curator of Collections & Exhibitions at the Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum, this groundbreaking exhibition brings together a powerful constellation of contemporary Maryland-based and internationally recognized Black women artists whose deeply personal and politically charged works bear witness to the past, illuminate its impact on the present, and conjure Afrofuturist visions.

Learn more about the exhibit:
 

Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum celebrated their name change honoring Harriet Tubman with Keynote by Nikki Giovanni on November 1st, 2024!

A New Chapter - Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum Renaming Ceremony & Maryland 160th Emancipation Day Reception featuring Keynote Speaker Nikki Giovanni took place on Friday, November 1, 2024 at 12:00 PM.

The public was invited to celebrate this momentous occasion via live stream on the BDTM Facebook and Youtube channels on Friday, November 1, 2024, at Noon.

The event was an afternoon of reflection, celebration, and inspiration as the new Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum name is unveiled with the powerful words of the esteemed poet, author, and activist Nikki Giovanni. A distinguished figure of the Black Arts Movement and a graduate of Fisk University (‘67), Giovanni's work has inspired generations, earning her numerous accolades including seven NAACP Image Awards, the first Rosa Parks Woman of Courage Award, and the Langston Hughes Medal for Poetry.

Learn More