George Peabody founded the Yale Peabody Museum in 1866 at the behest of his nephew Othniel Charles Marsh, and at 170 Whitney Avenue it ranks among the world's oldest and largest university natural history museums. It was founded in 1866 by the philanthropist George Peabody at the behest of his nephew Othniel Charles Marsh, an early paleontologist. Step inside and you’ll be following a long public life that saw the original building demolished in 1917, the museum moved to its current location in 1925, and expansions that now include the Peabody Museum and the attached Kline Geology Laboratory.
The museum is best known for the Great Hall of Dinosaurs, home to a mounted juvenile Brontosaurus and the 110-foot-long mural The Age of Reptiles. Its permanent galleries cover human and mammal evolution, wildlife dioramas, Egyptian artifacts, local birds and minerals, and Native Americans of Connecticut. Staffed by nearly a hundred staff members, the museum paused in 2020 for its first comprehensive renovation in 90 years and then reopened with more than twice the exhibition space on March 26, 2024.
Notice the mounted juvenile Brontosaurus beneath the 110-foot-long mural The Age of Reptiles in the Great Hall of Dinosaurs, reopened in 2024 with more than twice its old exhibition space after a ninety-year first renovation.