Ronald Reagan Presidential Library

Ronald Reagan's library crowns a hilltop in Simi Valley, northwest of Los Angeles, with sweeping views of the California hills he loved. Dedicated in 1991 in a low Spanish-mission style, it is the largest of the federal presidential libraries and, by a wide margin, the most visited — a status driven above all by one extraordinary exhibit.

In 2005 the library unveiled the Air Force One Pavilion, a vast glass hall built around the actual Boeing 707, tail number 27000, that carried Reagan and six other presidents. Visitors can walk through the aircraft, and the pavilion has drawn millions, transforming attendance at a library that had hosted a few hundred thousand a year before its arrival. A section of the Berlin Wall and a full-size Marine One helicopter stand nearby.

The collections document a two-term presidency that reshaped American politics: sweeping tax cuts and deregulation, a massive military buildup, the Iran-Contra scandal, and the diplomacy with Mikhail Gorbachev that helped bring the Cold War to its end. The museum presents Reagan as the optimistic communicator who declared "morning in America," and his role as a touchstone of the modern conservative movement.

Reagan and his wife, Nancy, are buried on the grounds, their graves looking out over the valley. The library doubles as a center of Republican political life, hosting presidential primary debates in a hall beneath the wing of Air Force One — a setting no other library can offer.