Blue Innovation: SC Museum of Natural History

Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History exterior.

Before Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History officially opened as a Museum in 1905, its foundational Laura Hecox Collection was on display at the Lighthouse where she worked as lightkeeper

Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History is the first museum in Santa Cruz. In 1904, Santa Cruz-born naturalist, Laura Hecox gathered and created the founding collection consisting of "seashells, minerals, fossils, Indian artifacts, and other specimens and curios” in the lighthouse where she lived with her mother and where her father Mr. Hecox was appointed keeper.

Today the Museum features educational, hands-on exhibits for children, families and adults who are curious about the world they live in and the natural history of one of the most scenic locations on the California coast. If you are a local Santa Cruzan, you most likely have driven or walked by the life-size gray whale statue, created in 1982, that rests near its entrance, between Tyrrell Park and Seabright State Beach.

whale statue

Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History has partnered up with organizations like the Kenneth S. Norris Center for Natural History and the California Native Plant Society to bring community scientists together for the CZU Lightning Complex & Community Science Project to explore and understand local fire ecology.

Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History staff and interns have inventoried over 1000 collections of objects including fossils, geology, and stone tool collections during 2021. You can also find a surfing museum, ethnography, history, and fine arts collections at the Museum. Head to santacruzmuseum.org/about-us/ to learn more.

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