Search | Royal Ontario Museum

Aliens Among Us: Why we want to believe

Why we want to believe Illustration: Bob Hambly Memory being the mind's dark mansion, I can't be certain this actually happened, but I think it did. In 1973 Rod Serling, then at the height of his Twilight Zone fame and a favourite subject of voice imitators everywhere, narrated a film

Portals to Paradise: Reflections at the Maya ruins

On the Yucatan Peninsula, a publisher finds the paradisal realm of the sun and conduits to the Maya god of rain This past summer,my wife and I were in Mexico, on the Riviera Maya, for the destination wedding of one of our sons. As our most recent vacation had been to the Quebec Winter Carnival,

People of the Corn

This staple crop, known as “the great mother,” fuelled the bodies and spirits of the ancient Maya “You are what you eat.” Was there ever such nonsense spoken? If it were true, then pandas would be made of bamboo, for they eat nothing else, and koalas would be eucalyptus leaves. And yet it

Wild in Toronto

Experts team up to produce a free booklet series that encourages city residents to appreciate their local biodiversity Photographing an eastern comma. The Biodiversity Series encourages people to observe the natural habitat of butterflies and to photograph rather than collect them. Photo:

First Word

A Letter from our Director and CEO A Dynamic Museum There are many myths about museums. One of them is that museums are static and unchanging—the museum as mausoleum. But the ROM is the opposite of that, and one of our tasks is to confound people's preconceptions. With its diversity of

ROM 100: Charles Currelly and the beginnings of the Museum's first century

Original (1914) ROM, view from northwest. The Royal Ontario Museum was established on April 16, 1912, by the signing of the Royal Ontario Museum Act in the Ontario legislature and officially opened to the public on March 19, 1914. The first ROM director, Charles Currelly, through his

Glimpsing Eternity: Notes from the Museum's keeper of gems

Katherine Dunnell MINERALOGY TECHNICIAN Department of Natural History Education 2012 Final exam pending, FCGmA Gemmology certification, Canadian Gemmological Association 1996 BSc (Honours) in geology and geochemistry, University of Windsor 1992 BA (Honours) in physical geography,

Shelter from the Sea: Wedgwood’s art and the science of the paper nautilus

Celebrated potter Josiah Wedgwood I (1730–1795) took great interest in the latest science and technology. His enthusiasm for conchology, the study of shells, inspired designs for a dessert service introduced by Wedgwood around 1790, including the bowl on which this one is based. Periodically, the

First Word

A Letter from our Director and CEO The Family Museum Through the spring of this year, we have been delighted with the success of the ROM’s family programming and the extent to which families have embraced it. March Break attracted nearly 55,000 visitors, a 12 percent increase over the

ICC: In Conversation

Dr. Carla Shapiro , a research fellow at U of T’s Munk School of Global Affairs, speaks with Francisco Alvarez, managing director of the ROM’s Institute for Contemporary Culture, about the upcoming ICC exhibition Observance and Memorial: Photographs from S-21, Cambodia . This important