Long Island Children’s Museum is a not-for-profit learning space devoted to the busy work of play. Our exhibits, programs and performances fuel creativity and collaboration to inspire millions of aha moments. At the Museum, children master skills and uncover passions that will stay with them throughout their lives. The future is always present here!
Artfully housed in a former airplane hangar, the award-winning Long Island Children’s Museum is a creative, innovative and inspiring destination for children and their grownups. 40,000-square -feet of indoor and outdoor exhibit space and a state-of-the-art theater provide families with ample opportunities to play and learn…together. The museum’s rotating schedule of workshops, performances and traveling exhibits provide visitors with new experiences each time they visit.
The idea for the Long Island Children’s Museum started as a dinner conversation in 1989 between a group of Long Island educators, artists and businesspeople—parents all. They wondered “Why didn’t Long Island have the type of institution they visited often on their family travels across the country?” Conversation led to commitment that has produced a nationally recognized community asset.
The museum opened as a private, not-for-profit institution in November 1993 in a 5,400-square-foot donated demonstration site. Community response was immediate and overwhelming leading to the decision to seek out a larger, permanent site. Nassau County approached the board with the idea of moving to Museum Row, a 15-acre cultural site at Long Island’s historic Mitchel Field; a site that would also become home to the Cradle of Aviation Museum —with future plans for the addition of a Firefighters Museum and Nunley’s Carousel.
The museum’s board launched a $17 million capital campaign in 1998 for building and renovation of a 40,000-square-foot facility, as well as the design and fabrication of museum exhibits. This public/private partnership has been widely touted by government officials as an ideal model for other museums to emulate.
The permanent museum opened on February 27, 2002. Long Island Children’s Museum is now home to 14 hands-on, interactive exhibit galleries, a 140-seat theater and four classroom-size learning studios. Indoor and outdoor gallery spaces are interdisciplinary, age-appropriate and intergenerational, fostering independent and cooperative exploration, and encouraging concept development and skills building.