Museum of the Gulf Coast

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This is one of my favorite places to visit in SouthEast Texas. At the port of Port Arthur, it houses many exhibits, divided into several different rooms. The ground floor has an archaeology dig, famous TV and movie stars from the region, as well as Civil War and Native American history. Interestingly, the guy who invented rebar is in the TV & movie star room, along with a swatch book of all his patented materials and photos of the sailboats and racecars his inventions have contributed to the performance of. Upstairs are the Music, Art and Sports rooms, an old lighthouse and carved ivory and china collections. In the Music room, there are little wall mounted jukeboxes located throughout, allowing you to punch in your favorite tunes by musicians born from Galveston to New Orleans. These include Tex Ritter (John Ritter's dad), Janis Joplin, Edgar Winter and his brother Johnny Winter, George Jones, the Big Bopper and more. There are also displays for each personality, including Janis Joplin's hand decorated Volkswagen Beetle, unfinished works of her art, family photos, school documents and album covers, one of Edgar Winter's performance costumes, photos and biographies of all featured celebrities. In the Sports room, you'll find football heroes like Bubba Smith and Jimmy Johnson, as well as a female martial arts champion and marching band memorabilia. The Art room is dedicated to Robert Rauschenburg, Texas native turned innovative, world-famous award-winning contemporary artist, with a son who followed in his footsteps. It's a really great way to spend an afternoon.