Attractions - Houston Museum of Decorative Arts

The Houston Museum of Decorative Arts contains what have been called the world's finest collections of antique glass and ceramics, as well as valuable antique furniture and music boxes. Visitors go on a guided tour of the museum, located in a beautifully restored Victorian house, and hear the story of Anna Safley Houston, who accumulated the collection and left it in trust for the people of Chattanooga when she died in 1951. The colorful but eccentric Mrs. Houston had at least nine husbands (and possibly more) and lived her last years in poverty, refusing to sell her priceless antiques to pay for food or medical care. The museum contains a gift shop which is open to the public.