Dick Messer

The Petersen Automotive Museum in Southern California is arguably one of the finest museums of its type anywhere in the U.S. Recently, Casey Annis sat down with Dick Messer, the Petersen’s first and now newly appointed director, to discuss the museum’s turbulent past and seemingly bright future.

VRJ: The Petersen Museum has gone through a pretty tumultuous time over the past year or two. It had been reported, for some time, that there was a lot of conflict between the museum and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles that governed it…