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Museum of Science and Industry
For me as a child, this was the "Happiest Place on Earth." I didn't notice the dust on the planes, the way so many displays didn't work, the large amount of homeless sleeping in the halls. No, to me the MSI was chicks hatching, a giant toy train, the Circus, walking through a Nazi sub, whispering across a gallery and milkshakes on Main Street. The highlight of course was our descent into the Coal Mine - though getting a Mold-A-Rama train engine was always important too. A funny thing happened while I was gone from Chicago - they began charging admission, cleaning and making operational the exhibits and generally updating the whole place. As an adult, it's not necessarily my favorite museum, but it is once again one I look forward to visiting. And the Coal Mine is still cool.
One disappointment - when I went on field trips in the 70's and 80's, the display of (real) fetuses tracking their growth in the womb was out in the open presented like any other scientific display. Now sadly, it's behind a wall with warning labels, somehow making it seem wrong or dangerous to see. These fetuses were collected in the 30's in humane ways and have been on display for 70 years. Only now is knowledge of our development as humans somehow too shocking to see apparently. 
(196 photos in total)
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