The Gallery of Marine Life
The Harvard Museum of Natural History
The centerpiece of the Marine Life exhibition—a floor-to-ceiling recreation of life in New England’s coastal waters—immerses visitors in the remarkable diversity and dynamic interplay among animals in marine communities just off local shores. As models of glowing jellies, a giant sea turtle, and other sea animals appear to swim above their heads, visitors learn about new research and explore displays of real fishes, mollusks, crustaceans, corals, and other marine organisms selected from the world-renowned collections of Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology.
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Swimming with Sharks
A Deep Dive into Shark Biology and Behavior
The Harvard Museum of Natural History
Nearly half a billion years ago, the first ancestors of a most remarkable group of fishes sprung forth from the evolutionary tree of life, exploding into a spectacular array of cartilaginous predators. Today, sharks are ubiquitous in and essential to our oceans, their lives intersecting with our own in important and surprising ways. In this remarkable exhibition, discover why the most massive sharks prey on some of the ocean’s smallest critters. Learn how to decipher dietary clues from jaws preserved in Harvard’s world-class collections. Explore how miniature teeth on shark skin help them move efficiently through water. Come to appreciate sharks not as deadly killers, but as fascinating creatures—more menaced than menacing—that play an outsize role in maintaining balance in marine ecosystems. Don’t miss this chance to come face-to-face with the ocean’s most famous, misunderstood megafauna!
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Sea Creatures in Glass
The Harvard Museum of Natural History
Many years before they were commissioned by Harvard University to make the Glass Flowers, father and son artists Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka meticulously shaped glass into lifelike models of marine and terrestrial animals. Renowned for their beauty and exacting detail, the Blaschka invertebrate models were commissioned by universities and museums throughout world during the nineteenth century.
In May 2014, the museum opened a permanent display of 60 models from the Museum of Comparative Zoology’s collection of 430 Blaschka invertebrate models. Delicate jellyfish and anemones, octopus, tentacled squid, bizarre-looking sea slugs or nudibranchs, and other soft-bodied sea creatures captured in glass are a sparkling testament to the Blaschka legacy.
The exhibit is the culmination of the Museum of Comparative Zoology's near completion of an eight-year project to curate, clean, and repair all of its 430 invertebrate models. Together with Harvard’s Ware Collection of Glass Models of Plants, with over 3,200 specimens on display, these restored glass animals now comprise the largest Blaschka collection on display in the world.
In May 2014, the museum opened a permanent display of 60 models from the Museum of Comparative Zoology’s collection of 430 Blaschka invertebrate models. Delicate jellyfish and anemones, octopus, tentacled squid, bizarre-looking sea slugs or nudibranchs, and other soft-bodied sea creatures captured in glass are a sparkling testament to the Blaschka legacy.
The exhibit is the culmination of the Museum of Comparative Zoology's near completion of an eight-year project to curate, clean, and repair all of its 430 invertebrate models. Together with Harvard’s Ware Collection of Glass Models of Plants, with over 3,200 specimens on display, these restored glass animals now comprise the largest Blaschka collection on display in the world.
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The Legacy of Penobscot Canoes
The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology
This exhibition explores the enduring importance of rivers and canoes in Penobscot tribal life and on relationships between the tribe and non-Indians.
Native American birchbark canoes have often been described as one of the greatest inventions in human history and were copied by Euroamerican fur traders and sportsmen. This installation features a rarely seen full-size bark canoe purchased from Penobscot Indian Francis Sebattis in 1912, as well as stone tools collected by Henry David Thoreau, who described the Penobscot and their canoes in The Maine Woods.
Native American birchbark canoes have often been described as one of the greatest inventions in human history and were copied by Euroamerican fur traders and sportsmen. This installation features a rarely seen full-size bark canoe purchased from Penobscot Indian Francis Sebattis in 1912, as well as stone tools collected by Henry David Thoreau, who described the Penobscot and their canoes in The Maine Woods.
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