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Vonnegut museum once again scrambling for new home

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The founders of the Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library are once again scrambling for a new home. Plans to move the museum to Massachusetts Avenue have fallen apart.

Vonnegut, the iconic “Slaughterhouse-Five,” author and Indianapolis native, died ten years ago today.

Julia Whitehead, the museum’s CEO and founder, said she can’t move into the building at 646 Massachusetts Avenue due to “structural concerns” she found after signing the lease. Her team filed a lawsuit against the building’s owners, 646 Mass. Ave. Partners, who declined to comment on this story.

Whitehead said the museum needs a new home because its current location at Indiana and Senate Avenue is up for sale.

The Mass. Ave. grand opening would have been last Saturday.

“It’s very hard to cancel a grand opening when people have already made their plane reservation and things, but it was the right thing to do,” Whitehead said.

She said she started the move to the location in October, but outside companies pointed out structural concerns. Whitehead declined to get into specifics.

“We’re anxious to move forward. We have this momentum going. We have a lot of community support,” Whitehead.

The museum is a cat’s cradle of Vonnegut’s life and work featuring his typewriter, rejection letters and a replica of his workspace.

A law firm donates the current space to the museum but now the location is on the market.

Whitehead said they’d like to move somewhere near Mass. Ave. but they’re open to other locations. She hopes to announce a new location this year.

“We’re much more than a building and we’ll be just fine,” Whitehead said.

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