My History, My Community, My Museum

The Museum 10:00 am - 5:00 pm, Wednesday - Friday 10:00 am - 5:00 pm, Saturday Entry Fee - $5 adults                  $2 students and children No Sunday hours and closed major holidays 106 Main Street (864) 229-7093 www.themuseum-greenwood.org

After a one year renovation, The Museum is set to reopen the weekend of Friday, September 5, 2008! 

To learn more about our renovation project, please CLICK HERE!

A private non-profit organization dedicated to serving the public since 1967, The Museum has over 16,000 square feet of exhibits ranging from regional history, cultural history, natural science, technology, and the arts.

Museum staff and volunteers also open the The Railroad Historical Center located at 908 South Main Street on Saturdays from 10 AM - 4 PM the months of April - October (weather dependent). The center features rail cars and gardens.  A 1906 steam locomotive takes the lead and is part of a "train" of seven cars ranging from the 1906 locomotive to a Pullman Standard car built in 1942.

Hatch The Past at The Museum!

Take a rare and exciting look at the life of dinosaurs through their eggs, nests and embryos in Hatching the Past: Dinosaur Eggs, Nests and Young.  The exhibit is on display at The Museum Friday, September 5, 2008 - January 24, 2009.  This remarkable hands-on exhibition offers an astounding array of authentic dinosaur eggs and nests collected from all over the globe – including those of each of the major plant and meat-eating dinosaur groups. 

Although dinosaur eggs were first identified in the 1920’s, their scientific significance was not fully appreciated until the end of the 20th century.  Today, dinosaur eggs are recognized for their enormous scientific value and for offering fascinating details and fresh insights into the behavior, growth and evolution of dinosaurs.   Hatching the Past presents new discoveries about dinosaur reproduction and behavior and introduces some of the fascinating people and science behind these discoveries.

Sauropods Hatching -  Hatchling emerging from egg while adults guard the colony from intruders - Herds of female sauropod dinosaurs called titanosaurs gathered at traditional nesting grounds some 80 million years ago in what is now Patagonia, Argentina.  They laid their eggs in uniformly spaced nests made by scraping and shaping depressions in the soft mud, then covered the eggs and left them to incubate in the warm sun.  Although adults may have guarded the outskirts of the nesting ground, newly hatched titanosaur young probably looked after themselves.  In future breeding seasons, female titanosaurs would return again and again to this same location to lay their eggs, a behavior called site fidelity. Artist - Luis Rey

This multi-media experience helps give credence to long debated theories that dinosaurs and birds are closely related. 

A captivating experience for all ages, Hatching the Past invites visitors to touch a real dinosaur bone and reconstructed nests, dig for eggs, experience hands-on exploration stations and view animated video presentations featuring well-known dinosaur experts.  Each science-rich section is enhanced with exciting life-like models of embryos and hatchlings, colorful illustrations of dinosaur family life and stunning photographs of some of the world’s most renowned dinosaur hunters and their discoveries.

Pecking Order - Oviraptor Adult Feeding Chicks - In this scene, set in Mongolia about 80 million years ago, a carnivorous oviraptoran dinosaur feeds its hungry nestlings.  Paleontologists working in Mongolia have discovered the fossil remains of eggs and embryos, as well as adult oviraptors sitting atop their nests of eggs.  This evidence suggests that oviraptors tended their eggs and perhaps their young as well.  Paleontologists do not know for certain if oviraptors had feathers as this artist shows, but other aspects of their anatomy and behavior suggest a kinship with birds. Artist - Luis Rey

The amazing collection of real fossils on view includes an authentic bowling ball-sized egg of a sauropod from Argentina – laid by a long-necked plant-eating titanosaur that lived 75 million years ago; a large cluster of eggs laid by a duck-billed, plant-eating dinosaur, and the longest dinosaur eggs ever discovered – almost 18 inches long – laid by a new giant species of oviraptor, a carnivorous, ostrich-like dinosaur.   A central feature of the exhibit is a presentation about the discovery of “Baby Louie,” – the nearly complete skeleton of a dinosaur embryo with its bones aligned in the proper position.

Charlie Magovern made this exceptional and rare discovery in 1993 when he was carefully cleaning a large block of eggs from China.  He nicknamed the embryo after National Geographic photographer Louie Psihoyos.  

Hatching the Past was developed by Charlie and Florence Magovern of The Stone Company, Boulder, Colorado in association with the Harvard Museum of Natural History.  The Magoverns gained national recognition when their work was featured as the cover story in the May 1996 issue of National Geographic Magazine.