Alligator Crashes Texas Museum!

A typical workday at the Spindletop Boomtown Museum in Beaumont, Texas, took an unexpected turn last month when a gift shop employee made a peculiar discovery. As she returned from a restroom break, she noticed an unusual figure lurking in the museum’s entryway. Upon closer examination, she confirmed her initial suspicion: it was an alligator! Jeanna Summy, the museum director, recounted in an interview: “She had never seen anything like that on the grounds.

But she was very calm.” The alligator had apparently wandered into the museum, which is designed to recreate life during the Texas oil boom of the early 1900s. Understandably, the staff were taken by surprise when the gift shop employee rushed to alert her colleagues.

Jeanna confessed: “I did not even believe her.” The museum staff quickly contacted the campus police department. Soon after, authorities and a game warden arrived to safely resolve the situation.

As the museum staff announced on their [Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/SpindletopGC/posts/pfbid0dKfb48UrGNiLM5kUi8bSZPcdirNB744TaLxAnAvxyxcHKC7zQd4wknGbr36sTAvSl) page: “Unexpected Visitor Alert! 🐊 …an alligator decided to check out the museum grounds. Thankfully, no guests were around, and with the quick response from LUPD and the Texas Game Warden, our scaly friend was safely returned to the wild.

Big thanks to our local heroes!” The game warden carefully secured the alligator, taping its mouth shut for safety, and relocated the reptile to a nearby habitat along the Port Neches River. **Although the incident was unplanned, it provided an exciting experience for the museum staff.** Jeanna even admitted, “To me, it was exciting. I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so cool.’ This is a bucket list thing for me.” The Spindletop Boomtown Museum will undoubtedly remember the day their visitor was a scaly, unexpected guest!