Summer Solstice: Night at the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture

Date: 

Friday, June 21, 2013 (All day)

Location: 

Peabody Museum
Inside the Peabody Museum: June 2013

Summer Solstice: Night at the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture

Free admission to the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture, including the Peabody Museum, Friday, June 21, 2013 from 5:00 to 9:00 pm.

Celebrate the longest day of the year with live music, ice cream, hands-on activities, and free admission to all four of the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture (HMSC): the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, the Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments (CHSI), the Harvard Museum of Natural History, and the Harvard Semitic Museum.

Join outdoor festivities on the new Plaza located between the Harvard Science Center and Sanders Theatre/Memorial Hall at One Oxford Street in Cambridge:

  • See traditional Aztec dances performed by La Piñata youth, as they celebrate the Solstice with indigenous, folkloric, Latin American music and dance
  • Watch and dance with the Red Herring Morris as they perform seasonal English ritual dances and erect a Solstice May pole 
  • Be part of a human sundial and tell time by your own shadow
  • Test a Viking sunstone—learn how the Vikings navigated even on a cloudy day using polarizing crystals
  • Enjoy rare public access to the roof deck observatory of the Harvard Science Center for solar–telescope viewing of the fading sun on its longest day—and enjoy a unique vista of the Cambridge and the Boston skyline

All HMSC museums will offer free admission and extended hours until 9 pm. See the new exhibitionTime and Time Again at the CHSI; the newly renovated Earth & Planetary Sciences exhibition at the Harvard Museum of Natural History; Stephen Dupont photographs of Papua New Guinea at the Peabody Museum, or a recreated ancient Israeli house at the Semitic Museum.

Summer Solstice 2013 is free and open to the public. Drop by before or after dinner in Harvard Square, or bring a picnic and stay 'til sunset. In case of rain, the event will move inside the Harvard Science Center.

Parking/Directions: Free event parking in the 52 Oxford Street Garage, Cambridge. 
The Plaza (located near Sanders Theatre) is a 6-minute walk through Harvard Yard from the Harvard Square Red Line T stop. 617-495-3045