Arizona Museum of Natural History, Mesa (must see)

Arizona Museum of Natural History, or Mesa Southwest Museum, is a natural history museum that exhibits the natural and cultural history of the Southwestern United States. It was founded as a small museum in Mesa City Hall in 1977 with a small collection of Arizona artifacts, in a building designed by Lescher & Mahoney and built in 1937 with WPA funds, that originally housed Mesa City Hall, municipal courts, city library, police and fire departments.

The main museum complex is currently about 74,000 square feet, of which about 46,000 square feet are dedicated to exhibitions containing a collection of about 60,000 objects of natural history, anthropology, history & art, with approximately 10,000 historic photographs. The Museum's exhibitions include a three-story indoor waterfall, a real territorial jail, and a recreation of the Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine.

The Southwest Gallery consists of a native peoples’ gallery, with exhibits about Paleoindian big game hunters and gatherers, the first inhabitants of North America, and the Desert Cultures that developed later. The Paleontology Section, which is the study of past life, is the primary emphasis of the Natural History Section of the Arizona Museum of Natural History. The Natural History Section explores, excavates, records, prepares, conserves, and researches the fossil resources in the collection at AzMNH. The Anthropology Section of the Arizona Museum of Natural History conducts research and develops exhibitions on Native American cultures and the archeology of southern Arizona. Archeology has been a major focus of the museum since its inception in 1977.