North Dakota Heritage Center & State Museum

North Dakota Heritage Center & State Museum, 612 E. Boulevard Ave. on the State Capitol grounds, is the home of the State Historical Society of North Dakota. The 97,000-square-foot center focuses on archeological, paleontological and historical interpretation.

The Adaptation Gallery: Geologic Time shows how geologic events transformed the environment, forcing flora and fauna to adapt or become extinct. Exhibits include fossils, a simulated prehistoric underwater world, and life-size casts of Tyrannosaurus rex and triceratops skeletons.

The Innovation Gallery: Early Peoples details the lives of Native Americans, the immigration of European-Americans and the history of the state’s earliest cities.

The Inspiration Gallery: Yesterday and Today demonstrates how agricultural innovation, energy development, manufacturing and technological advancement shape the history of the state and its people.

The center also has educational programs, a theater and a gallery for touring exhibits. In the Treehouse exhibit, children can climb into a tree house lookout and explore a kid-size grocery store, bank, fire station, locomotive and flight simulator.

Time: Allow 2 hours minimum.