The museum opened in 1931 in a two-story concrete structure built in 1909 as a concession stand for Schifferdecker Electric Park. Dedicated to the mining industry of the Tri-State (Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri) district, the museum preserves and displays the area’s mineral specimens and interprets its geology and geochemistry. Exhibits and photographs illustrate mining processes and methods and explain how the mining industry affected the region. The mineral collection purportedly rivals that of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. In October 1994, it was renamed to honor its longtime curator, Everett J. Ritchie.