Mutter Museum

Description:

• Kids will be fascinated, possibly frightened, and definitely grossed out by this hugely entertaining collection of medical oddities in an appropriately dark, dank, Harry Potter-ish setting in a grand 19th-century building in Center City. Three operative words apply: goiters in jars. Or, as a friend of mine says, "you ain't seen nothin' 'til you've seen the giant colon." These and 20,000 other creepy objects fill the Mutter Museum, including the Secret Tumor of Grover Cleveland and plaster casts of famously conjoined twins Chang and Eng, housed in a paneled, double-height gallery within the College of Physicians. This medical institution was founded by Dr. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence; it's not an active medical school, but is an educational society with an important historical library. Everything in the Mutter, which began as a private collection in the 1850s, is very Young Frankenstein: 10,000 horrifying antique surgical implements, shelves of swollen brains floating in fluid in vintage glass jars, and even the thorax of John Wilkes Booth. Oh, and you can have private parties there, too. Like maybe your wedding.

• © Frommer's 2012

Awards:

Frommer's

•  Highly Recommended 2010