The room in which the Museum is presently located was originally the First National Bank
of Parco, Wyoming.  The bank opened at 10:00 am on July 5, 1924 and closed on June 1,
1933 after transferring all business to the First National Bank of Rawlins.  The next occupant
of this room as the Parco Federal Credit Union.  The Credit Union conducted their business
for many years in this room, and it looks much the same as it did in the early 1920's.  Beyond
the inner door (that is now the town clerk's office) was once the Parco Mercantile Company,
that sold groceries and general merchandise.  Also, tucked in one corner was the Parco Post
Office.  All of the upstairs rooms of this building were the offices of the Producers and
Refiners Corporation.  The was one of the first buildings to be built and occupied.  The
name PARCO was taken from the first letters of the corporation name.

The founder and builder of the town and refinery was Frank Emerson Kistler.  Earlier, Kistler
had explored for oil in the area of what is now Bairoil (north of Rawlins) and brought in large
producing wells in the Lost Soldier Oil Field.  By pipeline the crude was pumped to a siding on
the Union Pacific Railroad called Lakota, that was located about half way between Parco and
Fort Steele.  However production far exceeded what could be shipped by tank car, so he build
a refinery at a location (along the Union Pacific Railroad) call Grenville.  To operate the refinery
required workman who needed a place to live, so he built a town next to the refinery
(on the west side) and name it Parco.  With the help of Denver architects William E. and
Arthur Fisher they laid out the town and designed the building in accordance with Kistler's
conception of how he thought the should look.  The result was an early Spanish Colonial
architecture that you see in the public buildings today. Listed on the National Register
of Historic Places #250