Mid-Way is a team of six graduate students from Carnegie Mellon University’s Entertainment Technology Center. Over the course of the semester, they will design an interactive prototype which could be further developed and fabricated for the Heinz History Center’s Summer 2027 exhibition on western Pennsylvania’s amusement park heritage.
Designed for multigenerational families and STEM-focused school groups, the experience imparts historical learning objectives by highlighting the innovations, technologies, and personal stories that shaped the region’s amusement parks. The project explores the future of museums through a unique projection-based, tactile interactive experience that brings guests together to realize that they are a part of the greater history of amusement parks in western Pennsylvania.
The Senator John Heinz History Center is Pennsylvania’s largest history museum and a proud affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution. Devoted to the history and heritage of Western Pennsylvania, their family of museums includes the Heinz History Center, Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum, Fort Pitt Museum, and Meadowcroft Rockshelter and Historic Village. The History Center is home to the Thomas & Katherine Detre Library & Archives.
Their mission is to engage and inspire large and diverse audiences through programs that enable links to the past, understanding in the present, and guidance for the future by preserving regional history and presenting the American experience with a Western Pennsylvania connection.
This work is accomplished in partnership with others through archaeology, archives, artifact collections, broadcast and electronic media, civic engagement, conservation, educational programs, exhibitions, events, library, museums, public outreach, performance, preservation, publications, products, research, technical assistance, and virtual programs.
