Majdanek is a very well preserved camp. Seventy of the original 280 buildings that were still in use still exist and occupy the site today. Unlike at places like Auschwitz where the SS dynamited the gas chambers before they all exited the camp at the end of the war the gas chambers, prisoner’s barracks and the administrative building and warehouses are still around. The memorialization efforts began in 1947 when the local population collected ashes from the victims into a mound near execution ditches and the crematorium. An official museum project began in 1949, including the preservation of gas chambers and baths and the rebuilding of fences, sentry boxes, roads, and barracks. The SS quarters and the officer’s house were used for museum administration and some of the museum …show more content…
Nearly $190 million was raised from private sources for building design, artifact, and acquisition and exhibition creation. In 1988 another President by the name of Ronald Reagan had a big part in the Holocaust Memorial Museum as well, he helped lay the cornerstone of the building and he was also involved in the design (which was ultimately done by architect James Ingo Freed). Dedication ceremonies were done on April 22nd 1993 and it included speeches by yet another American President Bill Clinton as well as Israeli President Chaim Herzog, Chairman Harvery Meyerhoff and the person who originally chaired the museum 15 years earlier in 1978 Elie Wiesel. The museum was then opened to the general public 4 days later on April 26th 1993. During the years of construction, a vast amount of work had to be accomplished regarding the Museum's content. The Museum's founding director, Jeshajahu (Shaike) Weinberg led this exhibition planning phase and served as its director during the first stages of the Museum's daily