Known as the first Latino art and history museum in the Midwest, El Museo Latino moved to its current red tile-roofed brick home about 30 years ago.
It’s a storied site — where South Omaha’s original high school was built in the late 1880s at a cost just above $10,000.
Over time the high school relocated and the structure was razed, reconstructed, rebranded and remodeled. But this week the landmark property and its owners are celebrating perhaps their most transformational stride: a $10.5 million renovation that carved out usable underground space, modernized infrastructure and doubled exhibit and gathering space in the heart of South Omaha.
Today the museum and cultural center that since 2015 has been on the National Register of Historic Places offers four additional art classrooms, a new downstairs gallery, upgraded restroom facilities and re-exposed windows in spots that had been bricked over for decades. Artists who perform inside a revamped hall and outside in a newly gated courtyard now can plug in electronic equipment without worrying about blowing a fuse…