Dear Visitor!
Welcome to the museum dedicated to the world’s most famous Hungarian: the genius of football, Ferenc Puskás.
The Puskás Museum is a place of cult significance. It is part of the vast group of buildings at the national stadium named after Ferenc Puskás, and is the only remaining part of the old Népstadion (“People’s Stadium”). In the 1950s Puskás and his teammates worked on building that shrine to football, which became the home of Hungary’s world-beating Golden Team, “The Magical Magyars”.
The team that had changed world football fell apart after the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and Freedom Fight, which was brutally crushed by Soviet and Hungarian communists. Several of its biggest stars, including its captain Ferenc Puskás, were forced to emigrate. As a player at Real Madrid and then as a coach, Puskás captured the hearts of football fans on every continent with his virtuoso skills and generous, kind personality.
After twenty-five years in exile, the Hungarian nation embraced him here again in 1981 at Népstadion, in a historic “old boys” match. (The teams’ dressing rooms were in the building which now houses the museum.) The stadium was renamed in his honour on his 75th birthday, when it became the Ferenc Puskás Stadium.
In 2006 tens of thousands of people came to pay their last respects to Puskás at his catafalque, which was erected on the pitch here. And here, as a symbol of the renewal of Hungarian football, a new shrine was built: the Puskás Arena. In the construction of this, use was made of crushed concrete from the old Népstadion. The centre circle of the pitch is exactly where it was in the old stadium.
The only surviving element of the old Népstadion building is the so-called “Tower Building”, which was intended to house the Puskás Museum. This was once intended to be taller, but the communists abandoned that plan – something which symbolised the political elite’s newfound disapproval of Hungarian football. Now we have added a floor to make it a worthy place to honour Ferenc Puskás and Hungary’s legendary Golden Team.
The Puskás Museum presents the life of the world’s most famous and popular Hungarian, Ferenc Puskás, and his homes – from a single room in Kispest to a luxury apartment in Madrid. It also presents his teammates, coaches, opponents, and the era in which he became the darling of the nation and the sporting world’s first superstar. In this we have incorporated many of Puskás’s original trophies, documents, items of furniture and personal possessions – as well as the most important, beautiful and exciting of the thousands of photographs and film clips of him from around the world.
Ferenc Puskás started out from a poor, tiny house in a small town in Central Europe – the region most severely stricken by the inhuman destruction and murderous ideologies of the 20th century. Through his talent, hard work and brilliance he became the first international star of what was becoming the world’s most popular sport. A poor, slightly-built boy grew up to become the 20th century’s highest scoring player at international level, the idol of millions, and a cause for pride and satisfaction among a Hungarian people that had suffered the injustices of history.
The Puskás Museum in Budapest tells his unique and fascinating story.
Join us and discover one of the world’s most uplifting success stories!