The McFaddin-Ward House is a historic house museum centered in a 12,800 square foot 1906 Beaux-Arts Colonial house. The museum, which opened in 1986, also has the 1907 Carriage House, with its garage, stables, servants quarters, and gymnasium; a visitor center; a curatorial/storage facility; and administrative offices located in a 1903 cottage. The museum is almost wholly supported by funds from the Mamie McFaddin Ward Heritage Foundation.

This museum has a wealth of 20th-century collections and historical knowledge. Although the museum s collections pertain solely to the house, the McFaddin family, and the collections that came with the house when it became a museum, they are large in number. Concentrated in the first half of the 20th century, the collections are a very complete time capsule of one family s possessions during this period. Space to exhibit the collections is limited, however, and that is one of the reasons why the museum initiated a cooperative exhibition with Beaumont s Art Museum of Southeast Texas. This exhibition placed a decorative arts exhibit from the McFaddin-Ward House s reserve collections in one of the Art Museum s galleries in 1994-1995.

A large number of research materials, including family letters, diaries, scrapbooks, and photographs are in the collections, providing rich documentation to complement the artifact collections. The museum has added to this base of historical knowledge with an active oral history program and other research of Beaumont s history during the first half of the 20th century. The museum uses this extensive historical material to put together a broad range of educational programs, several of which are done cooperatively with other local museums and historical organizations.

Regarding affiliation with the Resource Sharing Project, the McFaddin-Ward House does not have changing exhibit space, so would not be interested in borrowing other collections or exhibits at this time. The museum does engage in a number of collaborative projects, and would be interested in collaborating on exhibit projects, education programs, and publishing.

The museum was set up by provisions of the will of Mamie McFaddin (Mrs. Carroll) Ward. Before her death in 1982, she established the Mamie McFaddin Ward Heritage Foundation responsible for providing funding and administration for her former home to be used as an educational and cultural resource. Following instructions in her will, a six-person board of directors selected by Mrs. Ward assumed responsibility for the house in October 1982, shortly after her death. One of their first actions was to hire a professional director who, in turn, assembled a staff of museum professionals, security guards, housekeepers, and groundskeepers to begin the process of turning what had been a private home into a public museum.

The next four years were spent researching and performing restoration work on the house, setting up curatorial and administrative policies and procedures, inventorying and cataloguing the collections, and building a visitor center. The house opened to the public in March 1986.

A new director was hired shortly thereafter, and the museum began to expand its functions to include a full range of educational programs; annual scholarly conference, publications, and extended research on the house, family, collections, and the community, including an oral history program. In 1987, a 10,800 square foot building was constructed to house the museum's reserve collection and to provide curatorial office and work space. In 1988, the museum began exterior restoration work on the carriage house and stables, which at that time housed the museum's administrative offices. Late in 1989, the museum purchased and renovated an adjacent (to the carriage house) 1903 frame cottage to use as an administrative office space, and in 1991-92 the museum completed restoration of the carriage house and opened it to the public.