Join our museum’s Gallery Guides for a “drop-in” tour highlighting the central role of women in shaping chemistry and the material sciences throughout history.

Our Women in Chemistry Tour profiles women chemists from antiquity to the present, sharing stories of innovation, resistance, and change.

On this tour, you can expect to:

  • learn about the legendary founding women of alchemy
  • explore the connections between domesticity and distillation
  • see how wartime changed the laboratory

You’ll also meet pioneering chemists and chemistry educators, from 17th-century French alchemist Marie Meurdrac to Marie Maynard Daly, the first Black woman in America to receive a PhD in chemistry, and Rosalind Franklin, whose work in X-ray crystallography led to the discovery of DNA’s structure. 


Drop-in tours are free and no reservations are necessary.

More events

September 17, 2025
Programs, Lectures & Talks

Science & Football: How Gatorade Fueled the Dawn of Sports Medicine

Phoebe Miles, cofounder of the Cade Museum for Creativity & Invention, will tell the story of a drink that changed the world of sports.

worn cover of a recipe book from the 1500s
September 19, 2025
Free

Movies on the Mall: National Treasure 2

Join the Science History Institute at Movies on the Mall and learn about the history of parchment.

cover of a notebook
September 20, 2025
Free

Stories of Science: CollegeFest 2025

All Philadelphia-area college students are invited to visit us during CollegeFest, Campus Philly’s annual “Welcome to Philadelphia!” celebration.

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