T.T.Wentworth Museum in Pensacola

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The T. T. Wentworth Museum in Pensacola Offers Hours of Free Fun and Learning

Looking for someplace different to take the kids? The T. T. Wentworth Museum in Pensacola offers a fun learning experience that’s easy on the family budget.

Click here for a quick tour of the museum and its offerings.

With three floors of Florida history exhibits, interactive displays and a children’s play and learning area called the Discovery Gallery, this popular Pensacola museum features artifacts from ancient Native Americans through the present. Housed in the former Pensacola City Hall (built between 1907 and 1908), the collection takes you through time as well as through the interests and passions of its founder and namesake, Theodore Thomas "Tom" Wentworth, Jr.

Born in Mobile, Alabama in 1898, and growing up on the Pensacola beach, Tom Wentworth was a businessman, local politician and collector of extraordinary capacity. The story goes that after the hurricane of 1906, young Tom found an 1851 gold coin in the sand, which sparked a life-long passion for collecting historical artifacts. In 1914, at the age of sixteen, he opened his own bicycle repair business. It was here he started to assemble his collection and began displaying items in the bicycle shop's windows.

Recognizing the importance of preserving Pensacola history, Tom collected cannons and helped preserve buildings and historical sites around the city. Over the years, Tom’s collection grew and he built his first T. T. Wentworth Museum next door to his house in 1957. By 1983, the collection numbered over 150,000 artifacts and Tom agreed to donate it to the State of Florida on the condition it would be housed in a permanent location. It was the largest historical collection ever donated by a private individual.

The T. T. Wentworth, Jr. Florida State Museum has had a permanent home in the historic Pensacola City Hall since 1988 when the city built new offices on West Main Street. As you approach the Spanish mission style building, you may think it looks like an over-sized Alamo with its sturdy but graceful columns, balconies and arched windows. Inside, this Pensacola museum houses a wide range from archaeology to the Civil War.

T. T. Wentworth Museum Collections

First Floor
- Archaeology, How it’s Done
Native American artifacts, artifact conservation, an explanation of underwater archaeology and an exhibit of the 1559 De Luna Expedition, one of the oldest known shipwrecks in America

- Pensacola Under Five Flags
Spanish, British and French rule, the Confederacy and the United States are all represented through photos, weapons and displays of costumes and fortifications.

- T. T. Wentworth Story
How Wentworth amassed his collection, the story of the museum, the people and times

Second Floor
- Civil War in Pensacola
The first shots fired in the Civil War, Fort Pickens, uniforms and local figures like Delity Powell, Civil War nurse

- T. T. Wentworth Collection
Everything from hub caps, model planes, china and a moose head displayed like they were in the original Wentworth Museum represent a small part of the collection.

- Rotating Exhibits
A variety of exhibits created from the museum’s collections or from traveling exhibits are displayed here

- From Hoops to Hips
Changes in women’s fashions through the ages

Third Floor
The Discovery Gallery features a fort with a stockade, a Creole cottage, a trading post, and a sailing ship, plenty to entice and excite little imaginations. There’s even a touch-me wall of animal skins and mystery boxes.

The T. T. Wentworth, Jr. Florida State Museum is located at 330 South Jefferson Street in downtown Pensacola, (850-595-5990). The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is free.

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