n the early 1990s, Nancy Wrenn drove her minivan around Tyler with the back seats pulled out to accommodate a 3D mock-up on a 4-by-8-foot platform of what would eventually become the Discovery Science Place. The model demonstrated her vision for a place where children in the East Texas city could gain hands-on experience in the areas of science and math. This was more than 15 years before the Perot Museum of Nature and Science became a North Texas institution and nearly a decade before the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) curriculum was introduced on a national level. Wrenn took the prototype and her sales pitch to business owners and community leaders to secure funding for
