The Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance will build a new permanent home in the West End Historic District of downtown Dallas. The museum will have a new name – Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum – and an expanded mission to teach the history of the Holocaust and advance human rights to combat prejudice, hatred, and indifference at a time when Texas leads the nation in the number of active hate groups.

The new 50,000-square-foot museum will accommodate more than 200,000 visitors a year, and more than quadruple its exhibition space.

The new museum will be unique among the nation’s 21 Holocaust-related museums. In addition to a clear focus on the Holocaust, it will feature new exhibit galleries on human rights and American ideals. It will also feature modern, immersive and interactive content and technology along with an original boxcar used by the Nazis during the Holocaust to transport Jews and others. It will include a 250-seat theater, new classrooms, an expanded library and archive, modern technology throughout, additional staffing, and a special reflection and memorial area for visitors.

The museum has already raised more than $43 million of the $61 million budget; construction will take about two years to complete.