Morehead Planetarium & Science Center

Morehead Planetarium and Science Center is a unit of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill and was the first and largest full dome planetarium in the south.

Ten years after opening, Morehead Planetarium was called to serve not only the people of North Carolina but also the nation’s burgeoning space program. Astronauts needed training in celestial navigation to ensure that they would be able to pilot their spacecraft if navigational systems failed.

Between 1959 and 1975, nearly every astronaut who participated in the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab and Apollo-Soyuz programs trained at Morehead.

Now, Morehead's mission is to serve North Carolina and beyond by bringing together the unique resources of UNC to engage the public for an improved public understanding of science, technology and health.