Must-See Museums
A U.S. News tour of the new and noteworthy with local experts in tow |c Washington, D.C.; Houston; Santa Ana, California; Portland, Oregon; New York; Atlanta; Birmingham, Alabama; Jersey City, New Jersey; Washington, D.C.; Los Angeles
There's no business like museum business. Dozens of institutions have sprouted since last summer, pushing the U.S. tally past 8,000. Some of these new halls are compact and uncomplicated, like the Norman Rockwell museum in Stockbridge, Mass., which features more than 500 of the artist's paintings and drawings. By contrast, you need six hours at Space Center Houston to really do it justice. And a new museum, like a new car model, needs to work out kinks--a confusing floor plan, indecipherable signs, exhibits that fall short. Atlanta's new Fernbank Museum of Natural History, for example, bills itself as the biggest natural-history museum southeast of the Smithsonian. It features an impressive robotic-dinosaur display and a Grand Canyon film that will certainly thrill kids. But Emory University paleontologist Anthony Martin notes that most exhibits rely on replicas instead of real specimens, that texts are often dry and that "the technology dazzles only enough to interest children." U.S. News visited the most noteworthy new and newly renovated museums--with local authorities along as commentators.
SCIENCE LIBERTY SCIENCE CENTER Liberty State Park, Jersey City, N.J., (201) 200-1000 Parents who prefer their kids not to bounce like Ping-Pong balls through the more than 250 exhibits at this world-class science museum "will have to work at focusing their attention," says Joan Lucid, a second-grade teacher who has visited with both her class and her own children. One strategy: Concentrate on one of the three exhibition floors and cruise through the rest. Children under 5 might prefer the environment floor, with its rock-climbing wall and irresistible collection of giant live bugs that can be touched on request. On the health floor, teenagers can try out a drunk-driving simulator while younger children climb through a fully-equipped ambulance. The invention floor is for tinkerers of all ages and includes a 10-foot-high boom crane that visitors can operate.
The museum's location near New York Harbor is a bonus--it boasts views of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty that boggle even jaded New Yorkers. Ferries leave the park frequently every day for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, and the crowds are smaller here than at the Manhattan terminal. Sun.-Wed. 9:30-6, Thurs.-Sat. 9:30-8:30. Admission: $9 adults, $8 seniors and students, $6 children 2-12.
OREGON MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY Portland, (503) 797-4000 The new OMSI opened in October 1992 in a reincarnated power plant, an airy building with a compelling view of downtown Portland. "There is more than you can absorb in one visit," advises Cyd Kaeser, a frequent visitor with and without her fourth-grade classes. There are six halls, for physical science, space science, information science, life science, earth science and a special exhibit called "What Makes Music?"
One-time visitors will want to stop by the stream table in the earth-science hall, where they can build a stream bed that will withstand erosion, using sand, rocks and logs. The earthquake room--you mount a furnished platform that rocks--provides the sensation of a 5.5 on the Richter scale (the 1989 San Francisco quake registered 6.9). The pre-natal development exhibit in the life-science hall displays real fetuses from a couple of weeks old to near birth age. "What Makes Music?" is hard to pass by--even if all you have time for is a quick dance on the oversize, floorbound keyboard. Sat.-Wed. 9:30-5:30, Thurs.-Fri. 9:30-9. Admission: $6.75 adults, $4 children 3-17.
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