What is your favorite museum — and why?

Founded on April 13, 1870, the Metropolitan Museum of Art emerged from post-Civil War optimism when American expatriates in Paris and wealthy New Yorkers resolved to create a national art institution. The museum opened its first exhibition on February 20, 1872, in the Dodworth Mansion at 681 Fifth Avenue with John Taylor Johnston, a railroad executive whose personal collection seeded the museum, serving as its first President.

In 1880, the Met moved to its permanent home on Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street in Central Park. The original Gothic Revival building, designed by Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey Mould, has been greatly expanded over nearly 150 years. The iconic Beaux-Arts facade was added in 1902, designed by Richard Morris Hunt and completed by his son.

Henry Clay Frick, the Pittsburgh coke and steel magnate, began collecting art seriously in his late forties. In 1913, construction began on his New York mansion at 1 East 70th Street, designed by Carrère and Hastings to accommodate his growing collection. The residence cost nearly $5 million including the land. From the earliest plans, Frick intended to leave his house and collection to the public, following the example of the Marquess of Hertford's Wallace Collection in London.

Frick died in 1919, bequeathing $15 million and his Fifth Avenue mansion to establish the museum. After his wife Adelaide died in 1931, architect John Russell Pope converted the residence into a museum, which opened to the public on December 16, 1935. The Frick houses approximately 1,800 works of European fine and decorative art from the Renaissance through the 19th century, including masterpieces by Bellini, Vermeer, Rembrandt, Titian, Velázquez, Gainsborough, and Turner.

Founded in 1879 as the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts (renamed in 1882), the Art Institute emerged during a critical era when civic energies were devoted to rebuilding the metropolis destroyed by the Great Fire of 1871. Led by 28-year-old Charles Hutchinson, who believed Chicago was becoming too materialistic, the museum opened as both a school and a museum to provide a counterbalance to runaway capitalism.

The Art Institute found its permanent home in 1893, moving into a Beaux-Arts building designed by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge for the World's Columbian Exposition at Michigan Avenue and Adams Street. The building—its entry flanked by two famous bronze lions by Edward Kemeys—opened on December 8, 1893, and remains the museum's "front door" even today. The collection has grown to nearly 300,000 works, including iconic paintings like Seurat's A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, Grant Wood's American Gothic, and Edward Hopper's Nighthawks.

The Cleveland Museum of Art opened on June 6, 1916, the result of a remarkable confluence of philanthropic visions. Three wealthy Cleveland industrialists—Hinman B. Hurlbut (lawyer and railroad executive), John Huntington (industrialist and inventor), and Horace Kelley (real estate investor)—each independently left bequests for an art museum. Their executors cooperated to establish one grand museum instead of three lesser ones, combining their resources with land donated by Jeptha H. Wade II in Wade Park.

The neoclassical white Georgian marble building, designed by Cleveland architects Hubbell & Benes, cost $1.25 million (equivalent to $25 million today). At the opening, Wade proclaimed it would be "for the benefit of all people, forever"—a motto the museum holds to this day. The museum was free to the public two days a week from its founding and became the first American art museum to allow students to sketch in the galleries in 1919. Today, general admission to the permanent collection is always free.

Nancy's observation about "a period when museums were being endowed often" refers to the Gilded Age (roughly 1870-1920), when American industrialists and financiers created the cultural infrastructure that defines American cities today. This era of unprecedented wealth accumulation saw the founding of nearly all major American art museums.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Metropolitan Museum of Art were both founded in 1870. The Art Institute of Chicago followed in 1879, the Cincinnati Art Museum in 1881, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in 1900. The Cleveland Museum of Art (1916) and the Detroit Institute of Arts (1885) continued this tradition. These institutions were often founded by consortiums of wealthy businessmen who believed museums should bring art and culture to the American people.

This museum movement was driven by both progressive ideals and underlying nationalism. After the Civil War and amid massive European immigration, cultural leaders sought to define what it meant to be American and to prove that American cities could rival European capitals in cultural sophistication. Philanthropists like Andrew Carnegie (who built 2,509 libraries and founded multiple museums in Pittsburgh), Henry Clay Frick, Isabella Stewart Gardner, J.P. Morgan, and John D. Rockefeller transformed private fortunes into public cultural treasures.

Vatican Museums, Rome: Founded by Pope Julius II in the early 16th century, the Vatican Museums house one of the world's greatest art collections, including Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling and Raphael's Rooms. The museums contain approximately 70,000 works, of which 20,000 are on display across 54 galleries.

Florence: Nancy likely visited the Uffizi Gallery, one of the oldest and most famous art museums in the world. Built in 1560 as offices (uffizi) for Florentine magistrates, it became a museum in 1765. The Uffizi houses the world's finest collection of Italian Renaissance art, including works by Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael.

Milan: The Pinacoteca di Brera houses one of Italy's foremost collections of Italian paintings, particularly from the Venetian and Lombard schools. Founded in 1776, it includes works by Mantegna, Bellini, Raphael, Caravaggio, and Rembrandt.

The Louvre, Paris: The world's largest art museum and most-visited, the Louvre opened as a museum in 1793 during the French Revolution. Originally a royal palace built in the 12th century, it now houses approximately 380,000 objects and displays 35,000 works of art, including the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, and Winged Victory of Samothrace.

Great Britain: "All the big ones in Great Britain" likely included the British Museum (founded 1753, the world's first national public museum), the National Gallery (founded 1824, housing Western European paintings from the 13th to 19th centuries), and the Tate galleries (founded 1897, featuring British art and international modern and contemporary art).