News Flash

Aug. 29, 2016 - LEGO robot airplanes, sailboats and race cars, Kinect bridges and N-scale model railroads, as well as crafts and other creative learning experiences will show how various modes of transportation and infrastructure have changed through time and shaped how people live, at the Hampton History Museum’s free family event “Trains, Planes and Automobiles” on Saturday, September 10, 11:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.

Sylvan Learning Center is bringing a host of interactive LEGO robot vehicles. A robot sailboat that children can program will make sounds as it rocks back and forth as if it is sailing through a storm. Through a programmable LEGO airplane attendees will explore how to change propeller speed as it climbs up and dives down. Children can also challenge one another with LEGO race cars to the applause of cheering fans. Sylvan will bring several Kinect Bridges- Test Arch, Suspension, and Beam bridges to demonstrate their various applications and for attendees to determine which is the strongest. Families will learn where they can find examples of these bridges across Hampton Roads.

The Hampton Streetcar 390 Project, which is working in conjunction with the Hampton History Museum to bring the city's last remaining streetcar back to Hampton for restoration and display, will showcase historic photographs and items that relate the history of streetcars in Hampton, as well as a mock-up of the 390 streetcar in which children can have their pictures taken.

The Peninsula Model Rail Road Club will display a detailed layout ‘N’ Scale model railroad depicting the Chesapeake and Ohio line from Richmond to Newport News. The C&O was created by Colis P. Huntington and mostly moved coal and people between tidewater Virginia and Ohio through the coal fields of West Virginia. The later C&O evolved into CSX.

Staff and volunteers from the Virginia Air & Space Center will be demonstrating the science of flight with interactive activities and scale models of various airplanes and spacecraft. Children will attempt to create enough thrust to drive a pencil through a block of wood. Teams will put Bernoulli’s principle to the test and discover that higher velocity air creates lower pressure areas and has the capability to move objects. They will investigate the four forces of flight and have fun developing ideas about gravity, lift, thrust and drag. Teams will demonstrate Newton’s third law of motion (action-reaction) to each other, and discuss how airplanes and rockets fly.

Family activities are free of charge and take place in the museum’s Great Hall and courtyard continuously from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Admission to the museum galleries is a special $3.00 per person reduced rate on 2nd Saturdays.