The Maidu Museum & Historic Site in Roseville is an oasis in suburbia.

Saturday marks the one-year anniversary of a new museum building, which replaced the temporary modular building that housed the Maidu Interpretive Center. The new museum is the final component of a plan put into motion several years ago to establish a permanent testament to Maidu culture in Roseville.

The 30-acre site features Maidu grinding stones and petroglyphs, as well as indigenous plants and animals. The city of Roseville purchased the land from the federal government in 1969 for $100 per acre, according to the program from the museum's opening ceremony last year. The property borders the bedroom and commercial community Johnson Ranch and has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1973.

Roseville resident Myron Zents, along with then Parks and Recreation Director Ed Mahany and Nisenan Maidu elder Hickey Murray, sought and obtained the necessary interest for the project to build a museum. After years of lobbying and fundraising, the city opened the interpretive center in 2001.

The term “Maidu” includes three groups: the Mountain Maidu of Placer and Plumas counties, the Konkow of Butte and Yuba counties, and the Nisenan of Yuba, Nevada, Placer, Sacramento and El Dorado counties. Maidu people lived in the Roseville area for at least 2,000 years. Native Americans have lived in the area for approximately 9,000 years according to the museum's website.

Zents conducted the early tours through the historic site and began training the first volunteer docents in 1993. He died before seeing the culmination of his dream for the site, the new museum, but his wife still volunteers.

Today more than 40 volunteers lead hour-and-a-half-long tours through both the museum and the historic site. Volunteers complete a six-week training course on the history of the Maidu people and the site, indigenous ways of living, and Maidu stories and imagery. Staff member Heidi Frantz leads the training.

“The volunteers help facilitate and run 95 percent of the tours that we do on site,” interim senior supervisor Mark Murphy said.

Third- and fourth-grade school children form a large portion of the visitors to the museum and historic site, especially in the fall, since their curriculum includes Native American culture at that time.

“That’s where (the museum) parallels with the curriculum for the schools,” Murphy said. “That’s when we’re having 3,000-plus kids a month come through.”

Museum staff has established a routine where two classes tour the inside of the museum while two classes tour the outside. Each tour is an hour and a half. Most classes do both the inside and outside tours so they are on site from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The children break between the two tours for lunch at shaded picnic tables.

“It’s wonderful showing them the museum, taking them on the trail, showing them the petroglyphs,” volunteer Josephine Roscoe said.

Roscoe is retired and became a docent more than a year ago. She said she enjoyed learning about the Maidu people through the extensive training.

“I got hooked,” Roscoe said.

The new museum is more conducive to tours than the interpretive center was, said Paula Finley, project manager for the new museum’s construction, now retired from city employment.

The museum was constructed in the shape of a roundhouse, a typical Native community gathering place. The entrance doors face east, like in an actual roundhouse.

“The design supports the Native American influence and ceremony here on the site,” Finley said.

Local architects Williams + Paddon designed the 10,000-square-foot building and did much of the work pro bono, Finley said.

Both Native and non-Native people comprised a standing committee that advised the planning of the museum structure and its exhibits. This group, the committee on grants, exhibits and collection, included Maidu Indians from the United Auburn Indian Community in Auburn Racheria (which is composed of both Miwok and Maidu Indians), as well as parks and recreation staff, museum staff and other local professionals.

Museum staff consults with the committee on a regular, ongoing basis regarding museum exhibits, programming and communications.

Museum staff expertise includes collections and archeology. There are also historians and naturalists. Rick Adams, cultural specialist at the museum, is a Nisenan Indian.

The museum is comprised of two floors and features both rotating and permanent exhibits.

Former senior supervisor Kris Stevens was instrumental in developing the museum’s exhibits and programming, Murphy said. She retired in October and Murphy joined museum staff at that time. Prior to that he worked at Roseville’s other museum, the Utility Exploration Center.

Volunteers and docents, as well as local educators, also contributed to the research and design of the exhibits, including the visitors’ circulation and flow through the museum, Finley said.

On the first floor, the temporary exhibit “Our Precious Legacy: Mountain Maidu Baskets from the Meadows-Baker Families” runs through July 31.

The second floor of the museum is a gallery devoted to Native and related traveling art exhibits. The museum hosts a free “Night Out at the Museum” every third Saturday of the month to coincide with Roseville’s Art Walk.

The gallery currently features local Native youth art in the exhibit “Empowering Our People: Artistic Expressions of Native American Children.” The artists are students of the American Indian Education Program of Sacramento City Unified School District.

Museum staff members said they were relieved that the new building provides the gallery and office space fitting of an educational institution.

In its new capacity, part of the museum’s role is to serve as a resource to the larger community.

“Weekly we get a phone call or somebody drops in with questions about either artifacts and/or objects,” Murphy said. “The museum’s always been a resource for people within 100 miles.”

An important improvement over the temporary facility is that now the museum can support bus tours.

“(Visitors) wouldn’t come here because we didn’t have enough restrooms,” Finley said. The tour companies require at least four restroom stalls.

If the first year of operation is any indication, the museum will have continued strong visitorship.

The city celebrates its new Maidu Museum at Saturday’s anniversary celebration, with family activities like acorn-grinding and storytelling, followed by a reception and presentation on “Nisenan History of the Sacramento River.”

Upcoming events at the Maidu Museum include “Yomen: Leafing Out of Spring Celebration.” In its 10th year, this spring festival is scheduled for April 17 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Features include California Indian dance groups, Native poets, children’s activities, storytelling, indigenous plants, food and Indian crafts for sale.