model In March, 1961 a new science wing at the
California Museum of Science and Industry in Los Angeles opened. The
IBM Corporation had been asked by the museum to make a contribution; IBM in turn asked the famous California designer team of
Charles Eames and his wife
Ray Eames to come up with a good proposal. The result was that the Eames Office was commissioned by IBM to design an interactive exhibition called
Mathematica: A World of Numbers... and Beyond. The exhibition stayed at the museum until January 1998, making it the longest running of any corporate sponsored museum exhibition. After 2004, it is now owned by and on display at the
New York Hall of Science in
Queens, New York, though it currently lacks the overhead plaques with quotations from mathematicians that were part of the original installation.
Duplicates In November, 1961 an exact duplicate was made for Chicago's
Museum of Science and Industry, where it was shown until late 1980. From there it was sold and relocated to the
Museum of Science in
Boston, Massachusetts, where it is permanently on display in the Theater of Electricity. A third copy was made for the IBM Pavilion at the
1964/1965 New York World's Fair. Subsequently, it was briefly on display in
Manhattan, and was then installed in the
Pacific Science Center in
Seattle where it stayed until 1980. It was briefly re-installed in New York City at the
590 Madison Avenue IBM Headquarters Building, before being moved to
SciTrek in
Atlanta in 1998, but that organization was shut down in 2004 due to funding cuts. The exhibit was then shipped to
Petaluma, California to Lucia Eames, the daughter of the original designers. In 2015, the exhibit was acquired by the
Henry Ford Museum in
Dearborn, Michigan, where it is now on display. ==Exhibits==