On Monday afternoon, Bill and Shannon Miller, co-founders of the Johnny Cash Museum, announced their latest venture honoring a country music icon: the Merle Haggard Museum and Merle's Meat + Three Saloon, slated to open in Summer 2018.

"When the family of a legend hands you that legacy and entrusts you with that, it's something we don't take lightly," an emotional Bill Miller said during a press conference.

The museum will feature instruments, clothing, memorabilia, awards and other artifacts that belonged to Haggard, who died in 2016 on his 79th birthday.

Haggard was an architect of country music's Bakersfield Sound. His plainspoken songs, like "Sing Me Back Home," "If We Make It Through December" and "Hungry Eyes," earned him the nickname "the working man's poet."

"I think this venture will be a wonderful way to preserve Merle’s legacy and just keep his music going on and on," widow Theresa Haggard said on Monday.

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Merle's Meat + Three Saloon will be, according to its logo, "powered by Swett's." The Swett family, and their eponymous down-home restaurant, have been keeping Nashville fed for over 60 years. David Swett, the owner of Swett's Restaurant, said the new eatery will serve up "good Southern comfort food with a twist of soul."

Both museum and restaurant will be located at 121 Third Avenue S, next to the Cash and Cline museums. Bill Miller paid just over $7 million for the 15,447-square-foot building last fall. He's known for creating museums and other entertainment venues branded after country music icons and owns 73,872 square feet of commercial property in downtown Nashville.

Since opening the Cash Museum in 2013, Miller has added Nudie’s Honky Tonk at 409 Broadway in honor of deceased country music tailor Nudie Cohn. And in April, he opened the Patsy Cline Museum in the space directly above the Cash Museum.

Like Haggard, Miller has roots in California where his stints included serving as mayor of the city of Corona. Miller is also a former associate producer of live radio show Grand Ole Gospel Time and once owned an autograph and memorabilia company.

At the end of Monday's press conference, Merle Haggard was posthumously honored with the Country Music Association's Joe Talbot Award, which CMA chief Sarah Trahern presented to Theresa Haggard. The award is given in recognition of "outstanding leadership and contributions to the preservation and advancement of country music's values and tradition."

Previously:Cash Museum owner, Haggard’s family to announce new Nashville venture