A new museum opens at the Statue of Liberty. Now the millions of people who visit the statue every year can get the inside scoop on America’s favorite statue! (We wrote all about the new museum while it was being built. Check out these statue stories in Citizen Ship.)

The new museum is big—26,000 square feet. It stands on Liberty Island in New York City. It opens to the public on May 16. Inside, you’ll find the statue’s original torch and other artifacts that used to be in a smaller museum space inside the statue’s pedestal. Until now, only a small number of statue visitors could get tickets to see them.

“We looked at this small museum and thought, wouldn’t it be wonderful to . . . move it out to a place where more people could experience it,” says John Piltzecker, National Park Service superintendent of the Statue of Liberty National Monument and Ellis Island.

The new space is open to anyone who comes to Liberty Island. From the outside, the glass walls and copper-colored roof appear to be rising out of the ground. The structure is built from the same type of granite that’s part of the statue pedestal.

Inside, visitors watch a film. It tells how the idea for the statue came about. It shows how it was made in France and how it arrived in the New York Harbor. It explores questions: What did liberty mean then? What does it mean now? In the final section, visitors are encouraged to take selfies. They are supposed to answer this question: What does liberty mean to you?  

For freedom Christ has set us free. ― Galatians 5:1
The Statue of Liberty Museum, set to open Thursday May 16, 2019 on Liberty Island (AP Photo/Richard Drew)