Museum sights in San Jose
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A
History Park
Historic buildings from all over San Jose have been brought together in this open-air museum southeast of the city centre in Kelley Park. The centerpiece is a half-scale replica of the 237ft-high 1881 Electric Light Tower.
The original tower was a pioneering attempt at street lighting, intended to illuminate the entire town centre. It was a complete failure but, lights or not, was left standing as a central landmark until it toppled over in 1915 due to rust and wind. Other buildings include an 1888 Chinese temple and the Pacific Hotel, which has rotating exhibits inside. The Trolley Restoration Barn restores historic trolley cars to operate on San Jose's light-rail line.…
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B
Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum
One of San Jose's more interesting attractions is the odd and educational Egyptian Museum which has an extensive collection that includes statues, household items and mummies. There's even a two-room, walk-through reproduction of an ancient subterranean tomb. The museum is the centerpiece of Rosicrucian Park west of downtown San Jose.
Even more intriguing is the Rosicrucian Order itself. Headquartered in Rosicrucian Park, the order is a nonreligious fraternity whose members seek to achieve spiritual enlightenment and material success through the study of mysticism and metaphysics. As the order's own website slyly says: 'Rosicrucians are normal men and women. Perhaps some …
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C
Tech Museum of Innovation
You don't know the meaning of interactive until you've been to the 'Tech' Museum of Innovation, possibly the slickest museum on earth. You'll see bright and shiny exhibits on robotics, genetics and animation, with lots of cartoon characters hopping around in them. It's all like being dunked in a neon-bright, Nickelodeon-inspired pool of warm liquid silicon.
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D
San Jose Museum of Art
The city's central art museum is one of the Bay Area's finest, with a strong permanent collection of 20th-century works and a variety of imaginative changing exhibits. The main building started life as the post office in 1892, was damaged by the 1906 earthquake and became an art gallery in 1933. A modern wing was added in 1991.
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E
Children's Discovery Museum
This Downtown tech museum for kids has hands-on science and space displays, plenty of nifty toys and some cool play-and-learn areas such as the kooky 'Alice's Wonderland'. The museum is on Woz Way, which is named after Steve Wozniack, the co-founder of Apple and now a fifth-grade teacher.
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