AUBURN, Ind. — A northeastern Indiana auto museum has received a $500,000 grant for improvements that will include replacing a leaky roof that now requires more than 80 buckets to catch leaks throughout its third floor.

The Auburn Cord Duesenberg Automobile Museum announced the matching grant from the National Park Service last week.

The museum in the city of Auburn will match the grant with private donations to pay for the project’s estimated $1.1 million cost. It will replace the 12,000-square-foot roof and install a new heating, ventilation and air conditioning system, said Brandon Anderson, executive director and CEO of the museum..

He said the current roof has been in place since 1974, the year the museum — a National Historic Landmark — opened. Leaking water is damaging the building by pushing bricks outward and plaster inward, Anderson said.

“We’ve had every roofer you can think of come out here. It is beyond serviceable life. It can no longer be patched,” he told The (Auburn) Star.

“We have been waiting since January for news on this grant and are so ecstatic to share it with the public.”