1950-1959
1950
- the Museum statutes are approved;
- the general exhibition is expanded.
1952
- notes by an anonymous Sonderkommando member are discovered on the grounds of the former Birkenau concentration camp.
1955
- a new permanent exhibition is opened on the Auschwitz I site.
- a monument-urn is unveiled on the grounds of the former Birkenau concentration camp.
1957
- parliament passes a law fixing the boundaries of the Museum;
- the Documentation Department of the Cracow District Commission for the Investigation of Nazi War Crimes in Poland is transferred to the Museum, where it becomes the Archive Department;
- the first issues of Zeszytów Oswiecimskich and Hefte von Auschwitz (The Auschwitz Journal) are published.
1959
- the jury selects a winner in an international competition for a monument on the Birkenau grounds; the project is never realized because it violates the July 2, 1947 law on the inadmissibility of changes to the camp grounds.