Museum of Man

An enjoyable little museum. Not too big or overwhelming/​tiring. We entered post lunch around 3−4ish and got the two floors done within 3 hours. My son loved the monsters exhibit. I enjoyed that it was small enough for him to explore without me worrying where he was running off to. The architecture of he building and the park itself is gorgeous. We loved visiting it and will definitely be back to do the tower tour once he’s older. (Kids under 6 not allowed in tower tours). Will be back!

Underwhelming.
With the Museum of Man being located within a gorgeous building in the beautiful Balboa Park, I expected so much more when I made the trip out here last weekend. Balboa Park has a lot to offer and figuring that an Adult Ticket was only $ 12.50, I thought I would take advantage of the opportunity with exhibits with exciting names like BEERology, Monsters!, Human Lab, and Cannibals (a couple dollars extra).
Unfortunately, the exhibits here at the time of my visit were fairly underwhelming and unimpressive. There are also not many authentic pieces in this museum, just a lot of reproductions. The authentic mummies and shrunken heads were probably the only highlight of this museum.
The layout of the museum also makes it somewhat inconvenient in that it doesn’t wind around through the multiple exhibits. Instead, you must enter through the one entrance, just to meet a dead end at the end of the exhibit and exit back the way you came in.
Maybe I came in with too high of expectations for this museum. Maybe it is actually a very dull museum. Either way, I believe that your time and money are probably better spent in other parts of Balboa Park.
Recommendations:
Botanical Building
Desert Garden
San Diego Air & Space Museum
Casa Del Rey Moro Garden

A little disappointed that some of the exhibits are still under construction, but overall it was a great visit. A lot of interesting facts, especially in the racial diversity area. The wall of interesting facts over the centuries was also entertaining. My favorite part and the most interesting were the mummy and tomb exhibits, a must see. They have an interactive area for small children, with activities as well as arts and crafts. I will return when the other exhibits are available to view.

The Admission: $ 12.5 for adult
Beautiful architecture for the building. You can climb up the California Tower and see the great views of Balboa Park.
They also have exhibit for kids and real mummies.

I was excited about the lab portion of the museum, but not too impressed. There was a brain and a couple bones but nothing remarkable. The beerology was the best, with original pieces and interesting displays.

San Diego’s Museum of Man is an eerie, spectacular place. Its splendid baroque exterior is familiar for film buffs as the stand-​in for Hearst Castle in Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane. While it has amazing exhibits, its outside with its ornamentation and various statues is as enthralling. It’s no wonder that the Museum of Man hosts Halloween events. It’s a haunting location.
It has superb exhibits on evolution, mummies, the ancient Mayans and the Hopi kachinas. Since it’s got real mummies&shrunken heads from Papua New Guinea, the Museum of Man does come across as haunted as the nearby Whaley House. Their exhibit on Hopi kachinas sparked in me a fascination that, years later, would be confirmed at Santa Fe’s famous Indian Market, where the values of Hopi versus Navajo kachinas were being debated at a stand (the Navajo don’t have kachinas as part of their spirituality)
It’s an appropriate place to explore history, since San Diego is home of the oldest of the Alta California missions.

This was the only museum I got a chance to visit out of the large selection in Balboa so I don’t have much to compare it against besides other museums I have visited elsewhere but I was pretty let down.
I had high expectations for this place after seeing signs for the Beer and Monster exhibits but the exhibits were very small and didn’t have a whole lot of substance. Just by the time you were starting to dig into the material the exhibit would end and then you would go onto something totally different. The whole place seemed really disjointed with the way the exhibits were organized and it all seemed so random. Much of the display items are casts which is fine but its not as nice as seeing some of the real things. One major gripe I had with this place is the fact that it seems to be totally unheated. Normally in socal this wouldn’t be an issue but we visited on a particularly stormy windy day and it was super frigid inside which made it hard to enjoy the exhibits.
Out of the wide array of museums in Balboa I probably wouldn’t consider this one a must see.

The best thing this place has going is the two shrunken heads and the recipe on how you can make your own. They suggest wearing them around your neck when you are done, but I dono…
There is a socially engineered exhibit of the cultures. My favorite display was stacks of money geared to educate toddlers on the economics of the races. Here’s a big stack of bills almost 3 feet high. «That’s what white people make!» Here’s a stack about 4″ high: «That’s what black people make» then a stack about 6″ tall and «Here’s what latin people make». Hmmm. What conclusions can we make from this Billy?
There was a cool looking mummy discovered by a couple of teenage boys near Chihuahua, Mexico (
) They left it in a trunk in their friend’s house and forgot about it. 14 years later the friends mom was cleaning up and found the mummy. She called the police. Since it was over 500 years old, the police decided it was okay to put in a glass case at the Museum of Man and call her «Lemon Grove Woman» because the trunk was in Lemon Grove. Kids do the darndest things!
Nothing else stands out as «must see».

Love this place. They have such interesting exhibits, my favorites are the mummy’s, evolution, race, and genetic exhibits. There’s so much to learn, take your time to wander around.
We haven’t gone to the bell tower tour but maybe one day!

Museum of man is the perfect museum for adults who want to spend a day at a museum without fording the river of children or finding a spot to nap next to the Monet.
Located in the same building as the California tower, the museum of man’s façade is the most beautiful. The closest parking is either across the bridge at balboa and prado next to the lawn bowling, or at the small lot downhill from the plaza. I prefer the street parking and walking across the bridge for the full effect.
The prices are high, but we borrowed the free family pass from the library. The surcharge they tack on for the special exhibit seems pretty high to me, even as a member, but the torture exhibit was the reason we came this week.
The exhibits are well spread out, leaving plenty of room for you to wait your turn to read the exhibits. The regular exhibits, the Mayan ruins and the evolution of man, were interesting from a classic anthropological sense. However, I think the museum truly excels at their contemporary rotating exhibits. Their beerology fits perfectly with the location. I never knew there was such an international history about beer. And although the monsters exhibit is geared for children, I loved reading about the lore around the world.
Their specialty exhibit was really interesting! I just wish that there was more room or the signs were larger. As some write-​ups were lengthy, we had to wait some time in line to read it. It wasn’t the end of the world, but there is room for improvement. We will be returning for their specialty events.

This museum is interesting and covers anthropology and biology. I liked the exhibit on early humans and seeing how their skeletal structure differed from modern humans. The exhibit on race was okay, but I had seen that same exhibit at the Carnegie Museum of Pittsburgh a couple years ago and it was much larger. There were a couple of South American and ancient Egyptian mummies, and the explanations on how heads were shrunken was quite cool. The Monster exhibit was alright. Overall, it was an okay visit here.

Explored the Museum of Man before my tour of the California Tower (Must pay for the museum in order to see the tower). Different sections of:
Evolution of Men
Native Americans
Genetics
Monsters
Race versus the sun’s impact on skin pigmentation

As we were wandering Balboa over the weekend a couple stopped us and asked if we wanted their Museum of Man stickers, so we figured we’d stop in, given that it was free.
I don’t know if the Museum of Man knows exactly what it wants to be. Theres some archeology, history, science, cultural anthropology — all interesting but not all cohesive. It’s not laid out particularly well, and some of the exhibits have the potential to be engaging but the copy is written in a way that is a little try-​hard. Kids would probably be super into it, though. There is definitely potential there, but it doesn’t quite realize it.

The Museum of Man houses some decent exhibits but given the price it’s probably not worth it unless you want to see climb the California Tower or there’s a really good exhibition in town. There really doesn’t seem to be any cohesion between the various exhibits, and it feels like a lot of old stuff just thrown together in a hodgepodge.
Note that you can’t visit the California Tower on its own. Admission is $ 12.50 for the museum, $ 22.50 for the museum and tower, $ 20 for the museum and torture exhibit, and $ 25 for all three.
GOOD:
— Monsters: If you have kids this is probably the highlight of the museum. It’s filled with interactive stuff (audio stories, puppet theater, create monsters out of magnets), and is interesting for folks of all ages.
— Race: This was the most interesting exhibit for adults, exploring the misunderstandings about race and how we should all just get along.
— Mummies: The mummies section really took me by surprise and sort of blew me away. Not a huge collection but one that will enlighten and possibly shock you.
BAD:
— Maya: Slightly cool to see giant Maya monuments until you realize they are simply casts (albeit from 1915, but still just casts). There
— C-​3PO: C-​3PO is awesome but it’s in a difficult to find location as part of the lame modern portion of the Footsteps Through Time exhibit. It’s also disappointing that he’s in a glass case rather than out in the open.
— Adventure Kids in Egypt: While having a place where kids can dress up and act like they are in Egypt is a good idea, the exhibit was sort of run down and there were no docents or guides to help out. If you only brought one kid, it’s not particularly fun.
UGLY:
— Beerology: What a bust. It really just consisted of a handful of story-​boards and some old beer vessels. If I had specifically come for this exhibit, I would’ve been pissed.
— Footsteps Through Time: I like that they had an exhibit on evolution but it wasn’t particularly enlightening or well organized.
— Native Californians: Boring. Just static exhibits in glass cases. This is how museums were 80 years ago.

Looking for a unique and extraordinary exhibit? Head over to the Museum of Man and check out the Instruments of Torture exhibit. It’s set up in a special hall across the street from the main Museum.
It is mind blowing to see how humans haven’t really evolved in the evil ways we find to physically and psychologically torture and manipulate one another. The methods of choice are just a little different. It is hard to fathom that some countries still use some of the sadistic methods today. It will make you think about how or why fear is so powerful it can make humans do such inhumane things to each other.
Very powerful and thought provoking. Check it out. It’s graphic, so I don’t suggested brining children under the age of 15. If you are bringing teenagers, be sure to have conversations about the dangers of imposing their beliefs on others at any and all cost and how powerful ignorance and fear are.
As always the Museum has some really amazing exhibits that are thought provoking and very educational. A day well spent with children. Several of the exhibits are so engrossing. You’ll definitely walk away having thought provoking conversations with your children. It’s always worth the visit. A San Diego must in my humble opinion.

$ 67.50 for 2 adults, 1 high school student and one child. This was for admission to the museum and the torture exhibit. The building itself is beautiful on the outside and looks epic. Inside very confined. Monsters display was great, the Egyptian pieces are decent enough, and torture exhibit was the highlight. Do I think it was worth the $ 67 price tag? Nope. I didn’t research if there were any deals here, I paid up front. Most likely something I will skip next time I’m in the area.
As a note, it can get down right violet snagging a seat on the tram back to your car, avoid peak hours heading back to your car. Leave an hour before everything closes.

I love museums. Usually for only a small fee (sometimes you don’t even have that) you can get exposed to an assortment of exhibits that can stretch your imagination and enhance your views of the world around us. Although the internet can give us much broader breadth, and even depth, than any one museum, there is still something meaningful gained from seeing artifacts with your own eyes, or the wonder from a purpose-​made experiential display.
It is that special joy of discovery that is missing at Museum of Man. There is breadth — one only needs to walk 15 meters to go from an exhibit about monsters to large displays about Central American history and culture — but each experience is so short and the topics seemingly so random that you feel like you’re skimming over book covers on the shelf of your local children’s library. There are definitely some objects that will make you want to read a little more of the signage or discuss with your companions, but a general not-​curious person will be bored quickly.
+The Upsell
For $ 12.50 you get the basic museum. To add the new Tower Tour, that ticket goes up to $ 22.50. Oh yeah, there’s a torture museum exhibit across the way that costs extra as well. That experience is only an additional $ 2.50 if you get both the Tower and the Torture together for a total of $ 25. Can you skip the Tower Tour and just get the main museum and the Torture exhibit? Yes, for a cool $ 20. That extra $ 7.50 over the base price is *absolutely not worth the money.* Here’s the real trick: the Tower Tour is actually really good. Maybe not $ 22.50 good, but you probably won’t be here too often so you might as well make it rain. So it only costs an extra $ 2.50 for the Torture exhibit at that point… I’ll be honest and say you should just save that for In-​n-​Out or a Thrifty’s ice cream. Or just give it to the poor. You’d get more value from any of those options.
+First Time Open in 80 Years
The beautiful Spanish Colonial tower atop the museum has been closed to the public for 80 years, and finally opened for tours in January 2015. The roughly 40 minute tour takes you floor by floor from the ground to the 8^th deck where you have a lovely 360 degree view. There are frequent stops where your guides will tell you about the history of the building, Balboa Park and the city in general. It is actually quite wonderful and this was by far our most memorable part of the visit.
+The London Dungeon Did It Better
The Torture Exhibit. After you are warned not to take photos or videos inside (In a self-​confessed 180 from what I wrote earlier, I suspect the exhibitors realize how little value seeing these artifacts in person actually provides), you enter a long room with various torture devices along the walls. Each one has a short blurb that takes all of about 5 seconds to read. They are disturbing, but there is so little context or further exploration of how/​why/​when these devices were used that it feels like a real-​life version of a Yahoo News slideshow «article.» Swipe your body left six steps and read the next caption.
Come visit and support this institution, or don’t. We burned an easy 2.5 hours here making the overall trip probably worth it. The building and its history is easily one of the most interesting bits, but if you’re already in the doors with a paid ticket you may as well look at the mummies. (Aside: I actually loved the cartoony «I SAW MUMMIES» admission sticker we were told to wear.) The $ 25 per person could also be pooled and used for many delicious drinks at a bar while you flip through pictures of antiquities on your phones.

The Museum of Man was not like I imagined it in my mind. I remember being here as a child and it was a world that was beyond imagination. My trip this time just did not seem as nostalgic. It was a wonderful to revisit and want to come here with my Grands. This is a place of imagination of what was and maybe what is even to come. The workers here seem completely annoyed with all of their guests. It was almost as if we were intruding into their territory. This place is for everyone to enjoy. Keep that in mind.

Bottom Line: Offers shade and a cool place to retreat from the San Diego sun and a little bit of education but it’s really the visiting exhibits that are attractive.
If you are thinking about checking out the Museum of Man you will first have to decide how much you want to invest in Man. You can just get a General Admission ticket for the basic exhibits or trick out your experience by getting tickets for the visiting exhibit and/​or Tower Tour. For the current visiting exhibit, Instruments of Torture, you can head into the exhibit hall at anytime but for the Tower Tour, you have to make a reservation for a specific time and then meet your tour group at the appointed time.
Regarding the General Admission portion of the Museum of Man, I appreciate the education and culture of Balboa Park but the General Admission exhibits felt more like a snoozeum than a museum. Part of the problem is surely that I was raised on the Smithsonian system so I’ve been spoiled. The other part of the problem is that the general admission exhibits at the museum just aren’t that exciting. I was interested in the beer exhibit but found it to be lacking aside from the collection of growlers. However, I wasn’t interested in the adjacent Monsters exhibit but really enjoyed letting my fears get caught in the huge dream catcher.
After plodding along in the General Admission exhibits, it was time for the main event — the visiting Instruments of Torture exhibit from Italy. Instruments of Torture was fascinating, nightmarish, gruesome and entertaining all at the same time. I’m glad I didn’t eat beforehand and had I been hungry, the inhumanity of these devices would have stolen my appetite. There were plenty of families at the exhibit but I personally don’t think it’s a great place for young kids even though its history as these devices could certainly give a mature adult nightmares. The exhibit was done well, not too crowded and worth the money.

This museum always has the longest lines during December Nights, it is the only major museum not included in the Macy’s Museum Month discount pass, and it always has tourists swarming around the outside taking photos. All of these things tricked me into thinking that this museum was something really special. After three years of wondering what this place was all about, I finally checked it out.
I went because the Beerology exhibit is ending this summer, and I thought that might be something of interest. With all of the advertising they have done, I was really surprised to see that the entire exhibit is contained in one small room. The exhibit was interesting, but you could go through the entire thing in about 15 minutes.
Small seemed to be the theme for the entire museum. I didn’t pay the extra $ 10 for the torture exhibit, so perhaps that is a little more involved than the rest. The coolest of the core exhibits was probably the one on Ancient Egypt. Seeing a real mummy was the most memorable part of the museum.
If you have limited time in SD I would probably skip this one. If you are a local, you may want to check it out once.