Port Discovery Children’s Museum is a non-profit institution in the historic Fish Market building in Baltimore, Maryland‘s Inner Harbor. It is 80,000 square feet and has three floors of exhibits and programs designed to be interactive and educational. It receives more than 265,000 visitors annually. The museum focuses on children ages birth through 10 and their caregivers. The Baltimore Metro Subway’s Shot Tower/Market Place station serves the museum.
As the premier children’s museum in the mid-Atlantic, Port Discovery Children’s Museum educates children and inspires life-long curiosity. Their play-to-learn philosophy allows children to discover and explore the world around them and lead smarter, healthier, more engaged lives. Port Discovery is a non-profit Children’s Museum, so each dollar that you spend on General Admission to the Museum helps support their mission to provide every child with access to purposeful play, as well as to take their programs and exhibits out into schools, Judy Centers, Head Starts, libraries and other locations in the community!
History
The original Baltimore Children’s Museum was a Baltimore City agency founded in 1976 and was initially housed in The Cloisters, a historic property in Baltimore County. The property and structure were donated to the City, and the Museum operated out of this location for nearly 20 years. In 1990, the Baltimore Children’s Museum formed its non-profit corporation and merged with the Maryland Children’s Museum. The combined entity’s Board of Directors and Baltimore’s Mayor Kurt Schmoke decided to relocate the museum to downtown Baltimore to reach a broader audience. A 35-million-dollar capital campaign led by the Board of Directors resulted in the renovation of Downtown’s historic Fish Market building, which became the new home to Port Discovery Children’s Museum in December 1998. The building underwent significant renovations in 2019. It added several new exhibits as well as a lunchroom and additional restrooms. The renovation cost $10.5 million.
Exhibits
- SkyClimber
- The Port
- Art Showcase – a rotating art exhibits
- BGE Studio Workshop
- PD Presents
- Tangram Wall
- Chessie’s Grotto
- Kick It Up! Bed Bug Exterminator Baltimore
- Royal Farms Convenience Store and Fill’erFiller Up Station
- Adventure Expeditions
- The Oasis
- Tot Trails
- Over/Under Weaving Wall
- Wonder Widgets
- The Overlook
- Previews, Pop-Ups & Prototypes
- Sensory Wall
- Tiny’s Diner
- Wonders of Water (WoW!)
- Harvey M. Meyerhoff Gallery
Support
Admission and membership fees cover only 65% of the Museum’s annual expenses. Hence, contributions from individual donors are critical to providing children and families with innovative museum experiences that inspire joy, creativity, and curiosity. Your Annual Fund gift helps cover essential materials and services like art and technology supplies, exhibits and public programs, field trips for low-income students, outreach to schools, maintenance of the historic home, and much more. Planned giving options allow you to create a lasting legacy of support, and tribute gifts can honor unique relationships or memorialize the loss of a loved one. Workplace Giving is another option for help.
Address: 35 Market Pl, Baltimore, MD
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