Welcome to On Location, a weekly feature spotlighting landmarks and establishments seen on screen that viewers can visit IRL. Whether you’re seeking a fun selfie, breathtaking vistas, or maybe a show-accurate treat, follow along for some bucket list destinations.
ABC’s Abbot Elementary typically ends each season with a school-wide field trip. In Season 1’s “Zoo Balloon,” the school went to the Philadelphia Zoo. The school visited The Franklin Institute in the Season 2 finale. Season 3 was an exception where the field trip to Smith Playground occurred in the penultimate episode, and the finale focused on Janine’s (Quinta Brunson) year-end party. This year, they returned to form with the school visiting Philadelphia’s Please Touch Museum in the Season 4 finale.
Abbott Elementary, “Please Touch Museum”
The student tension in Abbott Elementary‘s fourth season finale came from the older students who felt the Please Touch Museum was exclusively a younger kids’ field trip destination. The museum’s staff (as portrayed by the Abbott Elementary actors) manage to tap into the eighth graders’ creativity by setting them up to write and produce a show in the Playhouse Theatre.
Having the Abbott teachers play each other while cold-reading student-written lines from poster boards is a stroke of brilliance and illustrates the humor and good-naturedness with which the educators approach learning. It was also freakin’ hilarious.
Hometown Homage
As one of only two episodes filmed on-site in Philadelphia — the other being the Franklin Institute field trip — Abbott Elementary hired over 300 local child and adult background actors. The museum paused its marble floor renovation, shut the doors to the public for a weekend, and employed their staffers for the sixteen-hour shoot days to take care of the cast and crew.
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Abbott Elementary writers pitched the Please Touch Museum field trip idea back in November 2023 but held off on it until the Season 4 finale. As this coincided with the Eagles winning the Super Bowl, some of the team members brought the Lombardi Trophy to the set during shooting. Keen-eyed football fans even spotted offensive lineman Jordan Mailata in a scene in the episode. Mayor Cherelle L. Parker also dropped by the production.
Elevating Play
Philadelphia’s Please Touch Museum began in 1976 as the city’s first museum dedicated to children aged seven and under. The original pilot program location on the top floor of the Academy of Natural Sciences was only 2,200 square feet and could only accommodate 25 children at a time. In 1978, having expanded to a full-fledged museum, it relocated to Cherry Street. Six years later, a three-storey, 30,000 square foot building on North 21st Street opened to the continually growing demand for the museum’s programming and exhibits. In 1988, they purchased the building next door for even more exhibition space.
In 2008, having completed a three-year-long total renovation and restoration of Memorial Hall in Fairmount Park, the Please Touch Museum opened to the public in its current location. The historic Memorial Hall, originally opened in 1876, has 76,650 square feet of space on the main floor and a basement. The iron and glass dome’s roof reaches 150 feet high and houses the 1908 Dentzel Carousel.
Come Play!
The Please Touch Museum’s operating hours are 9 am to 4:30 pm Monday to Saturday (closed on Tuesdays). There are select and specific Sunday hours you should check before visiting. They also offer two-dollar admission on First Wednesday nights of the month from 4 to 7 pm. General Admission is $22 (for adults and children ages one and over). Parking in the gated lot costs $16. Unlimited carousel rides are $5 per child (one caregiver per child rides for free.
Membership really looks like the way to go if you plan to visit multiple times. Starting at $165/year for a family of three, it includes admission, carousel rides, parking, and discounts for the cafe, gift shop, and additional guests. Additionally, as part of the Association of Children’s Museums Reciprocal Network, a Please Touch Museum membership entitles a member to discounted admission to over 200 other children’s museums.
Abbott Elementary episodes stream on Hulu.
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