Based in Montreuil, the Living History Museum (Musee de l'Histoire Vivante) promotes social, working-class and popular history. Founded in 1939 by elected Communist representatives in the spirit of the Front Populaire, the museum and its collections are an important place of memory in the “red suburbs”.

The museum holds major items relating to the Second World War and, in particular, the Communist Resistance: memorial objects such as the “Châteaubriant plates”, a large number of photographs, posters, clandestine prints and prison diaries, and paintings: a scene from the Liberation of Paris by Lilly Steiner and The Death of Danièle Casanova by Boris Taslitzky (1949).

The museum stands out not only for its associative nature and its “bottom-up” approach to history, but also for its function as an archive center. It holds the archives of the PCF underground secretariat and of resistance fighters such as Joseph Billiet, Daniel Renoult, Jacques Duclos, Louis Odru, Paul Vienney - or Marie-Thérèse Douet, who kept a notebook recounting her experience of the Liberation of Paris.

The museum's programming focuses on the contemporary period, with the Second World War regularly featured in its temporary exhibitions, events and cultural and educational activities. Throughout the year, the museum offers a documentary workshop on “Women in Resistance”, and is open to supporting projects on this period.