The Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG) Centennial Celebration Association (ACCA), a 501c3 nonprofit, is working to create the APG Discovery Center, where technology, education, and heritage come together to tell the story of innovations past and present that trace their roots to Aberdeen Proving Ground. The vision is to provide an interactive educational space for learners of all ages to experience science and technology through hands-on exhibits and demonstrations. At the APG Discovery Center, they will explore, experience, invent, create, and play with technology, leading them to a greater understanding of the scientific principles at play and the history of that technology’s development. The center will be located in Aberdeen, Maryland.

The APG Discovery Center is intended to replace the US Army Ordnance Museum, once Harford County’s top tourist attraction, with an APG-centric science and technology center outside the gate. Harford County lost a major asset and its largest tourist attraction when the Army Ordnance Museum at Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG) was closed due to Base Realignment and Closure legislation and moved to Fort Lee in 2011. At its peak, the Ordnance Museum was drawing over 200,000 visitors per year and was an economic driver for the region. In addition to its loss as a major tourist attraction, the Ordnance Museum’s relocation to Virginia was also a loss for Harford County’s heritage, as the Museum documented and publicized this region’s role in developing technology that has had an enormous global impact on the battlefield and beyond.

The ACCA’s goal is to create the most visited tourist attraction north of Baltimore. We want families, retirees, history buffs, and students from all around the Mid-Atlantic to travel to the APG Discovery Center to explore science and technology and be inspired to create and innovate. We want to tell the stories of the region’s rich technology heritage and contribution to society. We want to create an interactive space where we can light a fire of discovery in students of all ages and from all backgrounds. For 100 years, Harford County has been home to some of the most brilliant minds in science and technology. Their inventions have changed how people live, work, and play around the globe. It is only fitting that Harford County is also home to a world-class Discovery Center.

At the APG Discovery Center, students of all ages step back in time to experience a day in the life of APG inventors, like Herman Heine Goldstine, who, working with the Moore School of Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, developed the first computer, the ENIAC. And then they trace that technology forward and see the impact Mr. Goldstine had on the world. Or they tand in the shoes of the laboratory chemist who invented the first modern gas mask and then engage in a demonstration of modern gas mask testing. In other parts of the facility, students engage in interactive exhibits that demonstrate computer programming, how email travels from one place to another, how cell phones work, how dogs are trained to sniff explosives, and much more. In each exhibit area, stories are told about specific individuals that worked at APG – extraordinary inventors and ordinary workers. In this way, students make a connection with STEM careers past and present.

APG Discovery Center classrooms are set up to accommodate laboratory exploration. Students, under the supervision of a teacher, learn about biological and chemical sciences. In other labs students are exploring properties of physical sciences.

In large multi-purpose rooms, workshops and presentations take place. Non-profit groups come in to use the facility for events like Science Cafes or after school field trips. APG leaders meet their VIP and dignitaries at the APG Discovery Center to start a day of tours. Professional associations hold “Ted” Talks on science topics at the APG Discovery Center. Families drop in for workshops on specific topics, like the physics of ice skating. Student groups visit from school systems in Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, to take part in exhibits that are aligned with Next Generation Science Standards. Community organizations have exhibits in the APG Discovery Center to tell their own stories… i.e. the story of Bluegrass Materials and the technology of mining, or the story of APG Federal Credit Union and the science of money.

For more information, please contact info@apgdiscovery.com.