The Glazer Children’s Museum — A Fun Place To Go With Your Kids This Summer! 

(Photos by Gary Nager)

So, with still three weeks left before the end of the sweltering summer and your younger kids have to go back to school, where can you take them for a fun day — any day — in air-conditioned comfort? 

I suggest a trip to the Glazer Children’s Museum, located in the heart of downtown Tampa’s Arts District, right near the Straz Center for the Performing Arts and the Tampa Museum of Art. 

If your kids love The Very Hungry Caterpillar and other books by Eric Carle, the Glazer Children’s Museum in downtown Tampa is hosting the traveling “Very Eric Carle: A Very Hungry, Quiet, Lonely, Clumsy, Busy Exhibit” through September 8. 

I had two reasons for wanting to visit the Glazer Museum. The first was that Jannah and I were going to be babysitting our young grandchildren — 4-1/2-year-old Rosie and her 15-month-old brother Gio — for five days and there’s only so much pool, TV/screen and dining out time this Grammie and Grampa can handle without having something to do and Gio isn’t old enough yet to sit through a movie, much less Busch Gardens or (gulp) Disney. 

The second motivation was the fact that the museum was hosting a new traveling, temporary exhibit that first opened in May — the “Very Eric Carle: A Very Hungry, Quiet, Lonely, Clumsy, Busy Exhibit.” Even my sons, now both in their 30s, grew up being read, and then reading themselves, Carle’s most famous book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and when I saw the promotional photos for the exhibit, with giant versions of each page that kids can walk through, I thought the opportunity was too good to pass up — especially at only $18 per person. 

But, while Rosie enjoyed the Carle exhibit — especially standing in front of the butterfly wings of Carle’s transformed caterpillar and tromping through the tall grass like the author’s The Very Clumsy Click Beetle — Gio was too young to appreciate it and even Rosie found almost everything else at the museum to be more interesting — and fun! 

Something For Every Young’n! 

While I refuse to call them “littles,” there’s no doubt that if you have children from toddler age up to at least 6-8 years old and maybe as high as age 10, there truly are many things all of them will enjoy at the Glazer Children’s Museum. 

On the first floor of the Glazer Children’s Museum, there are fun activities that involve water, lights and sound. In addition to the Eric Carle exhibit, the second floor has a fun “working farm” among its many exhibits that is perfect for kids from toddlers to at least ages 6-8. But, the excitement gets even bigger when you venture up to the third floor. 

On the first floor, your journey begins with “Tugboat Tots,” where the kids get to steer a mini tugboat, “fish” off a mini-pier and play “I Spy” with an ocean mural. There also is an open play space for kids ages 3 and under that Gio loved, especially the “tasty” blocks (photo left). Rosie put on a smock and played not only with gliding boats through the water, but also with light and sound on the colorful “Light Cloud” piano, which also is on the first floor. 

But, the second level was probably both of the kids’ favorite. It started with a visit to a farm, where Rosie sat on a pig statue’s back and bottle-fed it and got to “milk” a cow statue (with fairly life-like udders), while Gio gathered tomatoes and oranges in a wheelbarrow and walked around with them. 

From there, Gio spent a lot of time checking out the “Safety Village,” where he could put groceries at the Publix supermarket in a shopping cart (he thought the empty cart, above, was super-fun, too!), sit in a fire truck at the firehouse and play with stuffed animals at the “Vet Clinic.” Rosie first checked out the Eric Carle exhibit and then flew off to the two-story-tall, fully-enclosed “Water’s Journey Climber,” where she climbed way up high (tentatively at first, but she caught on fast) and then loved the journey back down even more! 

Rosie also got very into the “Family Play Project” area, where she cut and pasted different paper and fabric swatches to create a unique artwork. 

Both kids enjoyed the “Twinkle Stars Theater,” where Rosie tried on costumes and Gio loved banging the buttons that controlled the lights and sound on the theater’s stage. 

Rosie then found the “Vet Clinic,” where she looked at pretend X-rays of some stuffed animals and then took time to properly groom them with a blow drying hose. 

Rosie also felt like a big girl while sliding down the fire pole at the firehouse and watching her skeleton move along with her on “Skelevision” at the “Hospital” sponsored by St. Joseph’s Hospital. 

Among her favorite exhibits on the second floor, though, were the “Pizza Place” — where she created and “cooked” a pizza of her own design in the oven that looks hot, but isn’t — and the “Ice Cream Parlour,” where she made a two-scoop cone for Grampa and a cup of ice cream with toppings for Grammie. 

On To Big John! 

The third level of the Glazer Children’s Museum is where you’ll find “Big John,” purported to be the “world’s largest” triceratops. The 66-million-year-old fossilized dino, which is on loan for three years from Tampa-based businessman Siddhartha Pagidipati, is the focal point of the museum’s dinosaur exhibit. Big John was reportedly reconstructed in less than a week upon his arrival to the museum. 

Gio had a blast playing with the plastic dinosaurs and popping out of a dinosaur egg, while Rosie properly matched bone shapes to a small version of Big John’s skeleton. Both kids also got a kick of weighing themselves against Big John’s 10-ton weight. 

Of course, by now, the children had to visit the cute store back on the ground floor, where we bought them a mini-copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar and a transparent car filled with plastic dinosaurs. 

The museum also has a great private room for hosting kids’ birthday parties. 

Hop On The Pirate Water Taxi! 

Of course, after this three-hour romp, the kids were tired and hungry and, since we parked in the lot next to the museum, we were able to walk down to the Hillsborough River at the adjacent Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park and catch a ride on the Pirate Water Taxi that took us upstream to Armature Works — only one stop away. Because we’re Florida residents, adults can stop at all 16 of the Pirate Water Taxi stops all day for $26, while children ages 2-12 can ride all day for $16 (those under age 2 ride for free). Rosie thought it was so cool that she was riding a boat since her parents were on a cruise while we were watching them! 

More About The Glazer Museum 

The 53,000-sq.-ft. Glazer Children’s Museum opened in 2010 after a $22-million capital campaign, with construction beginning in 2009. It was named in honor of the Glazer Family Foundation, which donated $5 million. The Foundation, at that time led by Edward Glazer and his brother Bryan, was founded by their father, the late Malcolm Glazer, who was the owner and president of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Manchester United Football Club. 

The Glazer Children’s Museum dates back to Tampa’s original Safety Village, located in Lowry Park, which opened in 1965. According to the museum’s website, the museum’s Mission is to “create and foster engaging, impactful PLAY experiences for children and families to learn and thrive.” Its Vision is “a community that values PLAY as the foundation for the learning and development of families across generations.” 

All I can tell you is that it is a super-fun place and a great way to spend a day with your children or grandchildren. 

The Glazer Children’s Museum is located at 110 W. Gasparilla Plaza in downtown Tampa. A “Playmaker Membership” costs just $250 ($55 tax deductible) and includes 12 months of play for up to six members, access to members-only events and other discounts. For more information, including everything about memberships and donations, call (813) 443-3861 or visit GlazerMuseum.org. For the Pirate Water Taxi, visit PirateWaterTaxi.com. 

HerStory to be made at AdventHealth Center Ice Saturday!

Digit Murphy, pictured here coaching the Chinese National women’s hockey team.
(Photo courtesy of Digit Murphy via Getty Images).

Margaret “Digit” Murphy was strolling through the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, OH, one day, and asked one of the employees if there were any exhibits about some of the women — either executives, referees or television announcers — that had left their mark on the game.

“Follow me,” the employee said, and proceeded to take Murphy on a fruitless tour. Apologizing, the employee simply said, “Well, it used to be here.”

Murphy thought for the richest sports league in the world, pro football’s $100-million Hall of Fame would at least have something dedicated to women. But, she wasn’t really that surprised it didn’t.

“We can’t tell our story anywhere,” sighed Murphy. But, that sparked an idea.

Along with Wesley Chapel’s Jeff Novotny, Murphy has hatched an idea to bring those kind of stories, in this case, those specifically related to ice hockey, to the people.

First stop: Saturday, March 9, 1 p.m. at AdventHealth Center Ice (AHCI).

That day will mark the grand opening of the “Herstory Museum,” which will feature interactive displays on the second floor of Center Ice, in a viewing room next to the Top Shelf restaurant and sports bar, overlooking two of the skating complex’s ice rinks.

The grand opening will coincide with a large girls hockey tournament at AHCI, providing for a perfect backdrop. Murphy will be on hand to introduce the newest feature at the rink.

And, admission to the museum will be free.

Murphy is one of women’s hockey’s pioneers, as well a key force behind some high-profile cases involving Title IX, the federal law prohibiting anyone, on the basis of sex, from being excluded from participating or denied the benefits of sports, or being discriminated against under any education program or activity that receives Federal financial assistance.

She was having dinner with Novotny one night when she mentioned the idea of creating a “mini” museum, one that wouldn’t require its own building but could make use of technology to offer a wealth of important information and overlooked stories in a smaller space.

Jeff Novotny

Novotny, a project manager for American Consulting Professionals, LLC, immediately thought AHCI would be the perfect place for it, having taken in more than a million visitors in less than two years after opening, hosting dozens of hockey tournaments and serving as the home training facility for the 2018 U.S. Women’s Hockey gold medal winners.

After Novotny presented the idea to AHCI general manager Gordie Zimmermann, a three-year agreement was signed to bring the museum, which will be developed by Murphy’s Play It Forward Sport Foundation, to Wesley Chapel.

“You want to go to places that embrace you,” Murphy says. “Wesley Chapel has bent over backwards for us.”

For Novotny, the museum is a labor of love. He has three daughters, all athletes. His youngest daughter, Madison, spurred his interest in women’s hockey. Madison currently plays prep school hockey at the Northwood School in Lake Placid, NY.

He said bringing Murphy’s story and the Herstory Museum to Center Ice is a real boon for girls hockey. 

“She’s a legend,” he says. “It will inspire girls who read her story.”

The room housing Herstory on the second floor of AHCI is only about 100 square feet or so. When visitors walk in, they will immediately see a virtual brick wall where they can purchase a virtual brick, with the money raised going towards running the museum and for a scholarship for a local athlete. There also will be a selfie wall, where visitors can snap self-portraits and post them to social media.

The first display will feature Murphy, a former Ivy League Player of the Year at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY. She also produced seven Olympians while becoming (at one time) the all-time winningest women’s hockey coach in NCAA Division I history with 318 wins at Brown (she is currently 13th on that list).

At the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, she became the first American female color analyst for a women’s ice hockey game broadcast on television and, in 2015, along with Aronda Kirby, founded the UWLX, the first professional women’s lacrosse league in the U.S. 

Murphy and Kirby also founded the Play It Forward Sport Foundation, which is geared towards gender equity in women’s sports.

Honoring The Legends

Others who will have displays at the museum are:

• Katey Stone, who today is the winningest women’s coach in NCAA hockey history and the coach of the 2014 women’s silver-medal winning Olympic Team; 

• Sara DeCosta-Hayes, the goalie on the first U.S. women’s team to win a gold medal at the Olympics (in 1998); 

• Amanda Pelkey, the University of Vermont’s all-time leading scorer and a member of the 2018 U.S. team that trained in Wesley Chapel and won the gold medal in South Korea; and 

• Kitty Guay, who refereed games in the 2018 Olympics and most recently became the first woman to referee the famous 67-year-old Beanpot ice hockey tournament in February.

“We just want to elevate the conversation and tell stories that don’t get told enough,” Murphy says. “They just disappear, and they shouldn’t. Now, they will be there for the girls and the kids in the community. That’s the only way to advance the conversation and have women’s sports matter.”

Each of the featured women will have their own large vinyl display, and visitors can access a QR Code, or send a text to a certain number, to get more information and videos about each inductee. All of the information will be available online at GetHerStory.org.

Another wall in the Herstory Museum will one day feature a local hero, which could be anyone, says Novotny, but will likely be someone with a relationship with hockey. That person hasn’t been selected yet, but Novotny says that, at the grand opening, they will be putting out a call for nominations and hope to choose someone over the next few months.

Novotny says the recent success of the U.S. women’s team, and Zimmermann’s commitment to helping advance girls hockey in Florida, makes AHCI the perfect place for Herstory. He and Murphy would like to see the concept of recognizing women in sports scaled for other organizations as well, like the new Wiregrass Indoor Sports Complex — which could do similar mini-museums for volleyball players and gymnasts, as well as for high schools and universities and even corporations.

“The whole reason we’re doing this is for little girls to have leaders and role models,” Murphy says. “We want them to see there have been women just like them. If you can see it, you can be it.”

For more information, visit GetHerStory.org and PlayItForwardSport.org.