The museum is named for Fr.
Gregory Gerrer, a
Benedictine monk of St. Gregory's Abbey, who was an art historian and art collector. During his travels in the
United States,
Europe,
Africa and
South America, he acquired art and artifacts to exhibit in Oklahoma. In 1919, the collection moved to
Benedictine Hall where it was called St. Gregory's Abbey Art Gallery and Museum.
G. Patrick Riley visited the museum as a child in the early 1940s, and credits these visits as his inspiration to become an artist. In 2022, a large sculpture by Riley and fellow artist Glen Henry entitled "Trinity Eagle" was erected in front of the museum building. Starting in 1962, the Gerrer collection was on long-term loan to the
Oklahoma Science and Arts Foundation in Oklahoma City. St. Gregory's Abbey built a new building as a permanent home for the collection with matching funds from the Mabee Foundation. The Mabee-Gerrer Museum of Art opened in 1979. The building was designed by Chadsey/Architects from
Tulsa, Oklahoma. This was the first time that the gold jewelry, from the collection of Prince Fabrizio Alliata di Montereale, was publicly displayed. The exhibit ran from June 1 through October 31, 2004, and was featured in a documentary produced by Oklahoma's Public Television Station.
Mummy research In August 2015, SSM Health St. Anthony Hospital - Shawnee performed
CT scans on the two Egyptian mummies in the museum's collection. The mummies previously visited the same hospital in 1991 for X-rays. The scans showed that Tutu's organs had been individually mummified and placed back inside her stomach and chest cavity before she was wrapped in linen. ==Collection==