The Exploratorium turns 40!

The Exploratorium opened quietly that fall, slowly changing the way science museums are organized and oriented to their audiences. It combined a living laboratory, art, and interaction under one roof; the result is a place where science is accessible and owned by all.

In celebration of this anniversary, the Exploratorium is hosting a number of events at the museum over this weekend. Plus they are throwing in quite a treat…admission is free all weekend (November 7-8). For a full list of activities and an exceptional history of the museum, check out the Exploratorium’s 40^th anniversary website.

Exploratorium After Dark: Electrifying Science with Dr. MegaVolt
When: Thursday 11/5, 6-10 PM
Cost: Free for members, $14 for non-members (Adults 21+ only)
Details: Blow your mind with the electrifying science of Tesla coils and Austin Richards, PhD—aka Dr. MegaVolt. This electrifying Exploratorium Science After Dark will feature Dr. MegaVolt jousting with 14-foot electrical arcs from his high voltage Tesla Coil.

Cutting Ice into One with a Motorcycle
When: Saturday 11/7
Cost: Free
Details: Imagine a big block of ice suspended from the ceiling of the Exploratorium. Now imagine a wire wrapped around the middle of that ice block from which is hung a motorcycle. Chill out with other skeptics and watch the motorcycle fall to the floor as the wire very slowly cuts through the ice, but bear witness—the ice block remains one whole piece!

Iron Science Teacher
When: Sunday 11/8, 2-3 PM
Cost: Free
Details: Cheer on the competitors in this zany science cook-off, where teachers compete before a live audience for the revered title, 'Iron Science Teacher.' In recognition of the Exploratorium’s 40th birthday, this special edition of our popular show features a secret ingredient closely related to birthdays!

Something Incredibly Wonderful Happens: Frank Oppenheimer and the World He Made Up – A Conversation with Author K.C. Cole
When: Sunday, 11/15 at 3 p.m
Cost: Free with admission to the museum
Details: Discover the never-before-told story of Frank Oppenheimer, physicist, educator, brother of J. Robert Oppenheimer, and founder of the Exploratorium. Believing that “without understanding, we’d all be sunk,” Frank Oppenheimer created the Exploratorium to be a museum of human awareness that combined art and science while encouraging play, experimentation, and a sense of joy and wonder.

Neil Armstrong’s left boot print on the Moon—the celebrated ‘one small step’. Credit: NASA

I was in Oakland, lying on the green carpet of my family's living room floor, watching our black and white Zenith television set—the kind that would take a minute or so to warm up before delivering the handful of local VHF TV broadcasts within range of our aerial antenna.

Right. It was definitely another era. As archaic as the telecommunications technology may sound to those born after, oh, 1980, it was nevertheless the Space, not Stone, Age…. Never forget, the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon was the culminating moment of the whole adventure that started the Space Age.

It didn't really matter that our Zenith was a b/w set, as all the images from Apollo 11 and the Moon's surface were transmitted in black and white anyway. My eyes were riveted to the TV, the grainy, fuzzy image of the Eagle's landing strut and ladder as yet empty.

"What's taking them so long?" I complained impatiently (I was seven years old). I remember waiting for what seemed a couple of hours for the astronauts to come out.

"They're probably playing poker inside," was my dad's reply. I don't recall if I believed him or not. Finally, there was a booted foot at the top of the ladder, attached to the bulky white and gray form of a human in a space suit—Neil Armstrong, of course. And, history was made—twice: Buzz Aldrin came down the ladder soon after.

Some of you younger crowd may have been born into a world where humans walked on the Moon a long time ago, but I was born around the time it was actually happening. (In fact, I was born the year after the first human went into space; similarly my grandfather was born the year of the Wright Brothers' first aerial success—how time flies….)

On Monday, we not only mark four decades since that singular historic event, we do so at a time when there are plans afoot for humans to step onto the Moon once again.

Several robotic probes have gone Moonward in recent years, paving the way: Clementine, Lunar Prospector, and only last month the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) were launched in tandem. LRO will give us our most detailed and comprehensive view of the Moon's surface appearance and conditions to date, and will help to identify future possible landing sites. LCROSS will look for water ice in a crater floor at the Moon's South Pole by impacting it with an empty booster rocket and studying what is blasted skyward. Water on the Moon would be a resource to future human missions far more valuable than gold.

Neil's left boot print is still up there, next to the Eagle's landing foot, most likely as fresh and new looking as when it was made (unless it got bulls-eyed by a one in a million meteorite strike!).

As there is no air, and thus no erosion, on the Moon, the print serves equally well as a monument to that decades-ago venture, or as a logo for the enterprise of our return. Fitting, too, as the Moon could serve as a stepping stone to destinations beyond….