The Association's museum connects you with 5,000 years of human history in southwest coastal Florida by collecting, preserving, and interpreting the objects and traditions significant to the region's past. Visitors to the 30-acre archaeological site can experience prehistory by stepping inside "A Window to the Past," a unique exhibition about the gulf coast region's earliest people. Florida's pioneer life is explored by living history interpreters and by touring a home built in 1901, a citrus packing house, and Mary's Chapel. Strolling through one of the largest butterfly gardens in the region and the early 1900s formal gardens created by Mrs. Potter Palmer as part of her winter estate are a great way for visitors to learn about Florida's natural environments.
Educational offerings include field trips and hands-on activities related to pioneer life and archaeology. These docent led tours have served over 4,000 students per year since 1982.
A panel of professors and conservators details the excavation and recovery of the Civil War Union ironclad warship Monitor and the Confederate submarine Hunley. The panel discusses both the history of the two vessels and the technological challenges the excavations faced and face.
Students and Smithsonian National Museum of American History curators give a tour of the exhibition "America on the Move," which looks at how immigration and migration impacted American history and at the role of various forms of transportation.
To view this electronic field trip, select "America on the Move, Part One: Migrations, Immigrations, and How We Got Here" under the heading "Electronic Field Trips."
April 15, 2012, marks the centennial of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, a disaster that still looms large in popular imagination. Why is the Titanic so well remembered? What sets it apart from the hundreds of disasters at sea that have happened before and after?
Use the centennial as a chance to ask your students how they know what they know about history. Do they know about the ship? Where did they learn about it? From a book or a movie? Your students can bring together the skills of historians and scientists to uncover their own answers about the disaster—from who was on the ship to why it sank to how the story of the Titanic fits into history and the present day.
Where to begin? We've gathered some ideas for places to start your search for resources:
James Cameron's film Titanic has helped keep the disaster in public memory. But does the film say more about 1997 than it does about 1912? Historian Steven Biel shares a critical look at Titanic in a film review reprinted from the Journal of American History.
As homeport of U.S. Brig Niagara, the Erie Maritime Museum presents the story of Niagara as the reconstructed flagship of Pennsylvania and the warship that won the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812. Offering a wide range of multimedia and interactive exhibits and coupled with lively interpretive programs, Erie Maritime Museum vividly illustrates Niagara's history and the region's rich maritime heritage. As the premier exhibit at the Erie Maritime Museum in Erie, PA, the Niagara is docked for public viewing September through May and intermittently during the summer each year.
The museum offers exhibits, tours, and educational programs.
The Museum presents visitors with exhibits brimming with art and artifacts; contemporary, interactive areas for children and adults; an historic shipyard with five of the original 19th-century buildings; a Victorian-era shipyard owner's home; an active waterfront; and a life-size sculptural representation of the largest wooden sailing vessel ever built.
The museum offers exhibits, tours, boat cruises, classes, educational programs, research library access, and educational and recreational events.
The Corpus Christi Museum of Science and History presents the story of a cultural crossroads of the New World. With a confluence of natural history, science, people, and environments, the South Texas area has served as a stage for the ongoing discovery of the Americas. The museum's exhibits explore natural history and South Texas history, and include full-size, functioning reconstructions of Christopher Columbus's three ships.
The museum offers exhibits, self-guided and guided tours for school groups, tours of the Columbus Ships, traveling trunks available for rent, and occasional recreational and educational events.
The USS Constitution, or "Old Ironsides," is the oldest commissioned naval vessel afloat in the world. Built in 1797, the wooden ship saw active service until 1881, taking part in the War of 1812 and, as a training ship, in the Civil War.
Today, visitors may tour the Constitution.
Only yards away from the USS Constitution (or "Old Ironsides"), the oldest commissioned naval vessel afloat in the world, the Museum explores the history of this vessel. Interactive galleries take visitors through the ship's 200-year history.
The museum offers two permanent exhibits, as well as temporary exhibits; guided and self-guided tours for school groups; educational programs for K5; and occasional recreational and educational events.
Standing majestically across from downtown Wilmington, the battleship USS North Carolina beckons visitors to walk her decks and envision daily life as well as the fierce combat her veterans faced in World War II. The first fast battleship to join the American fleet during the war, she was then considered the world's greatest sea weapon. The North Carolina participated in every major naval offensive in the Pacific, earned 15 battle stars, and was home to 144 commissioned officers and 2,195 enlisted men.
The site offers a short film, exhibits, tours, and educational and recreational events (including living history events).