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15 Weird Museums You Never Knew Existed

Some museums hold stranger collections than others. Here’s our list of the exceptionally odd ones.

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"Alien Parking" Directional Sign
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Weird museums

With a world filled with billions of people, there are bound to be a variety of eclectic interests and museums are no exception. From bad art to bananas and roller skating to UFOs, there’s a museum for every person. Here are the strangest museums in each state.

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Courtesy Museum of Bad Art

The Museum of Bad Art

They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and to the curators at the Museum of Bad Art, none of these pieces are beautiful. They’re either bad pieces made by otherwise talented artists or bad pieces made by exceptionally untalented artists. The collection includes portraits, landscapes, and still life pieces. This one, for example, is “Mana Lisa” by Andrea Schmidt of Vancouver, Canada. You can see most of the collection online, but there are also three permanent galleries in the Massachusetts area.

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Courtesy Dog Collar Museum at Leeds Castle

The Dog Collar Museum

Located inside Leeds Castle in Kent, England, this museum showcases five centuries of dog collars. Some are iron, some are plastic, and some have large spikes. There’s something for everyone.

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Courtesy Fred Garbutt

International Banana Museum

You can find practically every object shaped like a banana at this museum in Mecca, California. Some examples: staplers, statues, record players, and salt and pepper shakers. Even better, you can also eat practically any banana-flavored treat here, like banana ice cream, banana soda, and, of course, banana splits.

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Courtesy Busy Beaver Button Museum

Busy Beaver Button Museum

Learn about the history of buttons. Browse a collection of political, humorous, and just plain entertaining buttons. Visitors can even make their own buttons at this hidden Chicago gem (or button?).

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Courtesy Museum of the Odd

Museum of the Odd

Next time you’re in Lawrence, Kansas, stop by the Museum of the Odd to see things you never thought you’d want to see. The museum is actually the home of Randy “Honey Boy” Walker, who has collected such strange items as Elvis Presley’s toenail, pictures of corpses in their coffins, and elephant dung in the shape of Adolf Hitler.

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Courtesy Mustard Museum

National Mustard Museum

Founder Barry Levenson is seriously dedicated to mustard. He left his job as an assistant attorney general to start this condiment-honoring museum in Middleton, Wisconsin. It holds a collection of nearly 5,700 mustards from all 50 states and more than 70 countries. We didn’t even know that many types of mustard existed!

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Courtesy National Museum of Roller Skating

National Museum of Roller Skating

This museum in Lincoln, Nebraska, boasts the largest collection of historical roller skates in the world. Some skates are almost 200 years old! There are also skating costumes, thousands of photos of skaters, and programs from national and international roller-skating competitions.

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Courtesy International UFO Museum and Research Center

International UFO Museum and Research Center

Do extraterrestrials exist? If so, what is their preferred mode of transportation? The IUFOMRC in Roswell, New Mexico, is dedicated to answering these questions and researching UFO activity. It includes exhibits on crop circles, Area 51, and other alien-related events. It even keeps a log of UFO sightings across the country. These are the 12 UFO myths scientists wish you would stop believing.

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Mob Museum building Las Vegas
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The Mob Museum

Located in Downtown Las Vegas in the United States, the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, also called the Mob Museum, provides a thorough history of organized crime and a view in the Mob world. Located in a former 1933 U.S. Post Office and Courthouse, the Mob Museum has both permanent and rotating exhibitions on everything having to do with the past and the present, including the Valentine’s Day Massacre wall and film selections. Here are 13 additional things to do in Las Vegas that don’t involve casinos.

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Museum for Bread Culture in Ulm
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The Museum of Bread and Art

Located in the German city of Ulm, the Museum of Bread and Art is exactly what you think it is: a museum about bread. German entrepreneurs Willy Eiselen and his son Dr. Hermann Eiselen founded the museum in 1955, with a focus on art and the global food system.

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New Orleans Pharmacy Museum

Located in an unassuming building in the French Quarter of New Orleans, the New Orleans Pharmacy Museum is a wonder to behold. The front of the shop contains apothecary jars, medical instruments, surgical tools and other paraphernalia pertaining to pharmacists in New Orleans while the back contains a setup of what it would look like for a pharmacist to work. Louis J. Dufilho, Jr. was America’s first licensed pharmacist and “the first to pass the licensing examination, therefore making his pharmacy the first United States apothecary shop to be conducted on the basis of proven adequacy,” according to the New Orleans Pharmacy Museum’s website.

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The Museum of Broken Relationships

The Museum of Broken Relationships opened in Croatia’s capital city Zagreb in 2010. Developed by founders Olinka Vištica and Dražen Grubišić, the idea, after their own failed relationship, was to collect items from other relationships and even included donations from local residents. The museum has since expanded to pop-up locations where you can have a look at the broken relationships of people from around the world.

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HALLDOR KOLBEINS/Getty Images

Iceland Phallological Museums

Located in Reykjavik, Iceland, the Iceland Phallological Museum is, according to its website, “probably the only museum in the world to contain a collection of phallic specimens belonging to all the various types of mammal found in a single country.” The museum brings the ancient science of phallology to light and allows people to take an educational and scientific approach to this field. There are more than 215 penises and penile parts in its collection.

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Courtesy Lee Maxwell

Lee Maxwell Washing Machine Museum

Who would have thought there would be such an interest in washing machines? The Lee Maxwell Washing Machine Museum, located in Colorado, has more than 1,400 antique washing machines. Lee Maxwell, a retired electrical engineering professor from Colorado State University, began collecting the machines in 1985 and the collection grew so vast that the Guinness World Record was awarded to him for the world’s largest washing machine collection. Here are 16 things you never knew you could put in the washing machine.

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Museum of Miniature Books

Books come in all shapes and sizes, and at the Museum of Miniature Books in Baku, Azerbaijan, these books come in miniature. The Museum of Miniature Books, which opened in 2002, contains thousands of tiny books from the private collection of bibliophile Zarifa Salahova. Some of the books are so small they can only be read using a magnifying glass! How’s that for dedication? Next, be sure to check out the most impressive library in every state.

Claire Nowak
Claire is a writer, editor and digital strategist with more than 10 years of experience reporting on facts, trivia and quotes. Her natural curiosity lends itself to stories on history, trivia and "Did you know?" curiosities, and her work has appeared in Taste of Home, The Family Handyman, The Healthy and iHeart Media. A former editor at Reader's Digest and proud Marquette University grad, she lives in Milwaukee with her fiancé and their corgi and enjoys binge-listening to true-crime podcasts.