Families invited to compete in live-action Hungry Hungry Hippos game

Local museum to host Family Game Night with board games, scavenger hunt and more

Play a live-action version of the board game Hungry Hungry Hippos.
Courtesy of Penn Museum/PhillyVoice

The Penn Museum will host a good ol' fashioned Family Game Night on Friday, Sept. 15. 

Better tell grandma and grandpa to bring their A game because the competition is sure to get fierce.

From 6-8 p.m., families can head to one of the museum's seven activity stations. There will be a bounce house, a puzzle race, a live-action version of Hungry Hungry Hippos, a scavenger hunt, a game of knucklebones (an old name for the game jacks), a skull matching station and a hieroglyph decoding station.

Guests will be competing for tickets, which will go toward a pick-a-prize raffle at the end of the night.

At 8 p.m., all will gather for a game of "What in the World?" based on the Penn Museum TV program by the same name that aired on WCAU Philadelphia for more than a decade and was syndicated nationally by CBS from 1951 to 1955.


RELATED: How to score free admission to Philadelphia's Magic Gardens in September | A guide to celebrating the centennial of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway


During the game, the audience is shown mystery pieces taken from the museum’s collection of nearly 1 million objects from around the world. Through close observation and deduction, the audience works to determine what each object is, who made it and when they did.

Family Game Night attendees can also play ancient board games like senet, the Royal Game of Ur, mancala, Pente and chess.

Those who work up an appetite from all the friendly competition can head to the snack bar, where light bites and alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages will be sold.

Admission, which includes one beverage per person, is $50 for a family of four or $15 per person. The evening is geared toward families with children ages 6 or older.


Family Game Night

Friday, Sept. 15
6-9 p.m. | $50 for a family of four or $15 per person
Penn Museum
3260 South St.
(215) 898-4000