The Houston Museum of Natural Science ( HMNS ) is an American science museum located in Houston , Texas , at the northern border of Hermann Park . It was founded in 1909 by the Houston Museum and Scientific Society, which was engaged in the creation of scientific and educational public institutions with free admission. More than 2 million people visit the museum annually.
| Houston Museum of Natural Sciences | |
|---|---|
| English Houston museum of natural science | |
 Southeast Museum Entrance | |
| Established | 1909 |
| Location | |
| Address | USA: Houston , Texas |
| Visitors per year | more than 2 million |
| Site | |
The museum complex consists of a central four-story building, where exhibits on paleontology, geology, and the history of space exploration are exhibited; planetarium, butterfly center and movie theater. The museum is one of the most popular in the USA and in the ranking follows immediately after the American Museum of Natural History , the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum de Young [1] . It is believed that the greatest interest of the public is caused by numerous guest exhibitions held in the museum.
History
At the origins of the museum was an organization created in 1909 under the name Houston Museum and Scientific Society, Inc. Exhibits of the main museum collection were acquired from 1914 to 1930. Among them was a collection on the natural history of Henry Philemon Ettwater and received as a gift a collection of John Millsaps. The latter formed the core of stones and minerals exposure [2] . Initially, the museum exhibits were placed in a town meeting in Houston, then for seven years in the central library, and in 1929 were transported to loschadku in the Houston Zoo ( Eng. Houston Zoo then ). Educational programs are in the museum since 1947, and in 1948 they participated 12000 children [3] .
In 1960, the museum was officially renamed the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences. Since 1964, a new museum complex was opened in German Park, which opened in 1969 [4] .
By 1980, the permanent exhibition of the museum consisted of a collection of dinosaurs, a space museum, geological, biological exhibitions and exhibitions dedicated to the extraction and processing of oil. In 1988, in memory of the crash of the Challenger (shuttle) shuttle , an educational center was opened. In 1989, the IMAX Cinema and the George Observatory, located outside the museum in the Brazos Bend National Park, appeared.
In 1990, the number of visitors to the museum exceeded 1 million people. The Trusteeship Fund offered to modernize and expand the museum, and from 1991 to 1994, new halls were built, including a butterfly center.
From March 2007 to September 2009, the HMNS used the new site at Woodlands Mall, where visitors could take part in the excavation of dinosaur bones [5] . In 2009, a branch of the museum was opened in the city of Sugar Land (Texas) , in an old prison building [6] . In June 2012, the exposure of dinosaurs was more than doubled [7] [8] . The museum currently displays 60 dinosaurs including three tyrannosaurs and a quetzalcoatl .
Notes
- ↑ Berger, Eric. Incredible growth at the Houston Museum of Natural Science . Houston Chronicle (2006, November 20.).
- ↑ Wilson, Wendell E., Bartsch, Joel A., Mauthner, Mark. Masterpieces of the Mineral World: Treasures from the Houston Museum of Natural Science / The Mineralogical Record in association with Harry N. Abrams, Inc .. - 2004. - P. 7. - ISBN 978-0810967519 .
- ↑ HMNS History . Archived March 22, 2010.
- ↑ Kleiner, Diana J., Holm, Patricia. "Houston Museum of Natural Science" . (2010, February 11). Texas State Historical Association, Retrieved 1 June 2014.
- ↑ The Woodlands Xploration Station . Archived on September 4, 2009.
- ↑ Visit HMNS at Sugar Land . Archived December 16, 2009.
- ↑ Csotonyi, Julius, White, Steve. (2014). The Paleoart of Julius Csotonyi . Titan Books. pp. 10, 154. ISBN 978-1781169124 .
- ↑ White, Steve. (2014). Dinosaur Art: The World's Greatest Paleoart . Titan Books. p. 12. ISBN 978-0857685841 .