South Jersey Museums

South Jersey's museums are brimming with state-of-the-art technology and exhibitions that let you touch, play, climb, explore and celebrate the people and places, arts and events that make the region a cultural hot spot.
With such a long and colorful past, it is no surprise that South Jersey's history museums are brimming with unusual artifacts and relics. One of the most extraordinary museums is 11 stories tall, has 142 guns, and floats! Permanently berthed at the Camden Waterfront, the Battleship New Jersey  is a hands-on, climb-on museum that offers a peek into the past life of the nation's most decorated battleship. Interactive exhibits lets visitors "launch" Tomahawk missiles or intercept high-level communications.

The fine arts galleries at the Princeton University Art Museum are like a quick trip around the globe. With a permanent collection that features more than 60,000 works of porcelain, pottery and ancient and contemporary art, the Princeton Museum's exhibits focus on the Mediterranean regions, China, Western Europe, Latin America and US.

Part fort, part museum, the Old Barracks in Trenton brings visitors face-to-face with centuries of military history. If the collection of Revolutionary War weapons, artwork and decorative arts don't capture your attention, the living re-enactments, complete with costumed soldiers and townspeople, just might do the trick.

The galleries of the New Jersey State Museum in Trenton can keep both history and art buffs occupied for hours. Start at the very beginning – that would be a few million years ago - with the Museum's Natural History collection, which includes more than 55,000 artifacts, skeletons, and fossils from the Cretaceous and Paleozoic eras that lay the groundwork for everything that happened afterward.

Then, once you're caught up on the last few thousand millennia, move on to the Museum's Archaeology and Cultural History collections. Discover Native American textiles and bead work that dates back hundreds, even thousands of years. Or step into yesterday where the collection of artifacts that includes everything from quilts and crocks and clocks and clothes and more portray the people and the events that brought us to where we are today.

A walk through the New Jersey State House in Trenton is a walk through the state's past. The second oldest state house in continuous use, the legislative rooms are not just the center of state government, they are a living museum that feature artistic and architectural elements that reflect important events in New Jersey's history. Guided tours through the Assembly and Senate Chambers, Senate Conference Room and Governor's Reception Room combine a living lesson in government with dramatic architecture, murals and works of art.

Immerse yourself into the rich culture of our native peoples at the Rankokus Indian Reservation's Native American Indian Heritage Museum. With a Native American guide, you'll explore exhibits featuring tools, clothing, musical instruments, and decorative arts that tell the history of the tribe from its earliest days, its culture and its arts. The 350-acre reservation in Rancocas also includes a re-creation of a native woodland village.

Stand back and watch children's imaginations bloom at the Garden State Discovery Museum in Cherry Hill. Named one of the nation's Top 20 children's museums by Child magazine, this is a child-sized universe where they can play at being a farmer, newspaper reporter, construction worker, shopkeeper, pet groomer, or almost anything they want to be. Watch as they climb the pint-size climbing wall, play in the giant pile of balls, or explore a Mummy's tomb. The kids will be having so much fun, they won't even realize they're learning.

Walt Whitman was a literary giant, but his home was small and modest. The Walt Whitman House in Camden was the only house the poet ever owned and it was here that he welcomed Thomas Eakins, Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde and other artistic legends. Today, the National Historical Landmark offers an insiders view of Whitman's life through a collection of furnishings, photos, and papers.

Alive and lively, intriguing and entertaining, South Jersey's museums offer an adventure in discovery.

Pictured: Old Barracks Museum, Trenton
Courtesy NJ Commerce, Economic Growth & Tourism Commission