Courtyard at Cooper Molera
April 3, 2020

Commerce and Industry: A Virtual Tour of Four National Trust Historic Sites

National Trust Historic Sites are open! We encourage you to check directly with each site for up-to-date information on available activities, ticketing, and guidelines if you are planning a visit.

Plan Your Visit

Next up on our virtual tour of the National Trust’s 27 historic sites: those specifically related to Commerce and Industry.

In our first tour to Sacred Places, we recognized that defining characteristics of the United States include religious freedom and diversity. Similarly, the National Trust’s four sites related to commerce and industry represent the varied experiences of Americans in their vocational pursuits, running the spectrum from entrepreneurial endeavors to the hardship of immigrant labor.

Now an economic superpower, the United States only emerged as such a little more than 100 years ago, and the places we’ll visit contribute to telling the full story of that emergence. Below we’ll travel through time on a coast-to-coast tour, starting with Cooper Molera Adobe and the Gaylord Building.

While Cooper Molera Adobe and the Gaylord Building focus on commercial enterprises, Hotel de Paris Museum and the Lower East Side Tenement Museum represent the domestic side of workers' lives. Hotel de Paris opened in response to a silver mining boom in Colorado, providing lodging and gourmet meals for miners and traveling businessmen. The Tenement Museum recreates the living conditions of New York's immigrant workers who built new lives in America; often lived in or on the edge of poverty despite full-time employment; and built a foundation for generations of Americans to come.

Check out the rest of our virtual tours of National Trust Historic Sites, exploring places related to Sacred Places, Garden Glory, Architectural Traditions, Presidential Retreats, Modernism, and Southern History.

Donate Today to Help Save the Places Where Our History Happened.

Donate to the National Trust for Historic Preservation today and you'll help preserve places that tell our stories, reflect our culture, and shape our shared American experience.

Dennis Hockman

Dennis Hockman is editor in chief of Preservation magazine. He’s lived in historic apartments and houses all over the United States and knows that all old buildings have stories to tell if you care to find them.

Share your stories from Route 66! Whether a quirky roadside attraction, a treasured business, or a piece of family history, we are looking for your stories from this iconic highway.

Share Your Story