MUSEUM & CULTURE
Museum of Science & Industry
Hillsborough County · Gulf Coast
Tampa's science center on Fowler Avenue, open since 1982, now carrying the name Museum of Science & Innovation and built around a very large dome theater.
ABOUT THIS PLACE
The museum began in 1962 as the Museum of Science and Natural History, became the Hillsborough County Museum in 1967 and the Museum of Science & Industry in 1976. It opened to the public at 4801 East Fowler Avenue on January 23, 1982, next to the University of South Florida and joined to it by a pedestrian bridge. A science center of 190,000 square feet went up in 1995 and made it the largest science center in the southeast at the time. The years since have been uneven. In August 2017 the museum closed most of its building to cut costs, and a plan to move the whole operation downtown was set aside in 2022 in favor of rebuilding on Fowler Avenue instead. The Saunders Planetarium, open since 1992, was rebuilt and reopened in 2025 inside a digital dome theater, named the Holloway Digital Dome Theatre in April 2026, and is the second largest planetarium in the country. On January 27, 2026, the museum changed its name again, to the Museum of Science & Innovation. Visitors today find hands-on exhibits, a simulated lunar base called Mission: Moonbase, a drone zone, a butterfly garden and displays on hurricanes and weather
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