What is your favorite FREE museum
 

ON our tipr this past summer, we ran into 4 nice free museums, What are some others to add to a list of interesting free muesums.<BR><BR>1. Sequim, Washington - local history. Big fossil found on local beach. Model of WWII coastwatching tower (they hope to get an actual one donated)<BR><BR>2. Forks, Washingotn - Logging museum. Logging tools, lookout tower, nature trail. I especially liked the list of what the loggers ate every week.<BR><BR>3. Alaska Police Museum, Anchorage - lots of guns, law enforcement patches<BR><BR>4. Cable Car Museum, San Francisco - Cable cars, see the actual cables in action

There's a very sweet little local museum in Lake George, NY in the town court house. It's a museum about local Adirondack history and it has a recreated pioneer log cabin with original utensils, furniture and tools. In the basement of the court house they have their original 2 jail cells, which are over 200 years old, preserved. It's a very nice little place and well worth a visit.

Certainly all of the Smithsonian museums in Washington D.C. Its the main reason why I love visiting the city.

The Getty Center is my favorite among free museums.

Every Tuesday there are free museums at Balboa Park, San Diego. The first Tuesday of the month is the Natural History Museum, the Model Railroad Museum and the Fleet Sceince Museum. My 2 yr old loves these. We have a great time. The History museum currently has an animatronic dinosuar exhibit including skeletons etc. My son loves it.

The Forbes Gallery in NYC - wonderful collections of all sorts of items-from toys to historical documents. By far, the best bargain in NYC!

I know it's the wrong board, but the British Museum is the best.

Smith Museum of Stained glass in Chicago. Also the Terra Museum is free until next July.

Julia, The British Mueseum is great, but as you said, it is the wrong board.<BR><BR><BR>I second Debs recomendation for Forbes Galley, a free museum featuring the Forbes family collections. <BR><BR>100s of toy boats, 10,000 toy solders<BR>and figures, the very first handmade version of Monopoly and other early sets, 12 Faberge eggs and many other Russian royal family items. <BR><BR>My favorite part was the two rooms of presidential memorabilia rotated from the 4,000 pieces in the Forbes collection. It included the note that Truman wrote to the critic who negatively reviewed his daughter's singing, the log book from the Enola Gay, Nixon's pardon and many Lincoln items.<BR><BR>And very few people were there.<BR><BR> Keith

ttt

Fort Worth's Kimbell Art Museum in a Louis Kahn designed building. Wow.

St Louis Art Museum. I love their acronym: SLAM.

While I'm at it the entire Forest Park area in St Louis is pretty amazing. The famous St Louis zoo is free and so is the science center. The IMAX is extra, but who cares? Seen one big movie with no plot you've seen them all... :-D

Indy! I am shocked! How can you not mention our own Indianapolis Museum of Art, which is undergoing an amazing expansion? It's a wonderful treasure trove of art and sculpture, and there's also the lovely landscaped grounds, the Lilly Mansion, the greenhouse area, the new restaurant...and it's free.

History Museum in St. Louis, Forest Park is free too. But the Botanical Gardens has gone up to $7! I'd still recommend it, if you haven't been.

Maymont in Richmond, Va - more like a park, also has animals in very natural setting, nature center. Always free to tour the grounds and gardens. Victorian era house has living history programs for fee most of the time, but free on certain days of the year.

I'm wondering here why anyone would restrict their options to FREE museums.

Even those with more than nominal charges are generally well worth the tariff.

Would you skip an incredibly worthwhile experience where there's a $5 admission in favor of another that's FREE?

Oops. You caught me dln. I'm guilty of the &quot;I don't appreciate my hometown&quot; mentality. :-) I use downtown Indy a lot, but since I drive up from the south I rarely go past 10th street now.

I do particularly enjoy the old Lilly mansion.

The National Gallery in Washington, DC. An absolute treasure trove. Each time I go back, I visit my favorite paintings and I feel as though I am dropping in on old friends.

djkbooks, when traveling by yourself, admission fees don't matter much. But when the whole crew wants to go, I really appreciate a free museum!

I would like to add that many museums have free reciprocity privileges for their members when traveling. For example, we belong to a science museum which lets us visit 200+ other ones. We also belong to an art museum which lets us visit several dozen others.

Carlos Museum at Emory in Atlanta. It has a $5 optional &quot;donation&quot;. It was the most amazing Egyptian exhibit I have seen with several mummies, jewelry, animals, and other treasures from ancient India, etc. It is a beautiful place and exhibited very well.