Finger on the Shutter

By: Jill Finger

Aug 21 2015

Category: Uncategorized

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On Thursday, Wes, Timothy, Desi and I drove to the New York State Museum in Albany.  There are exhibits of the sections of New York State and also the history of each section.  We started in the Adirondack section where there are many murals of the beautiful vistas.  The animals are so lifelike looking its as if they were going to walk down the hall with us–and that wouldn’t be good–that moose was huge!The mountain lion looked as if it was inspecting us as its next meal.We kept trying to find, and missing, the Native American section.  Timothy and Desi are studying the map, figuring out where we went wrong. Success!  Behind the mastodon bones was the entrance to the Native American section.The long house had a section set up as if it were in use today, and also a section where the kids could try sleeping in beds.  There was another bed on top, used for more sleeping area or storage, or as Wes said, “The Native Americans invented the bunk bed.”
Timothy’s favorite bird in the bird section was the blue jay.  It did look like it could fly right out of the display. The section on New York City included a subway car, which is old news to Desi, but the boys enjoyed being straphangers.  We even visited Sesame Street, which was complete with Oscar in his garbage can.

Also, the New York City section is a 9/11 memorial with artifacts from the World Trade Center, one of the ruined fire trucks, and a 24 hour timeline.  The timeline starts with the 6:33 am sunrise and chronicles the entire day, as each event happened, ending with the sunrise of a different world the following day.   It was heart wrenching and had me in tears.

The 4th floor has a restored antique carousel, which runs every 15 minutes.  We were a few minutes early, and the carousel worker was very entertaining. 

He asked the kids waiting in line questions about animals, the world and did math facts with them,  making the waiting time pleasant for all of us.

Wes and I plan to go back, just the two of us, to fully explore the museum. Doing it with children, while delightful, is seeing it and explaining it on their level, while as adults. we’d spend more time reading the written explanations and absorb it better.  But, both ways of exploring the museum are great.  I always find it interesting what children find fascinating. For example, Timothy loved the displays of all the different rocks found in New York State. He also had me take a lot of pictures with my phone.  I promised him prints so he can take them to school.  When asked, Desi didn’t  have a favorite part, he just enjoyed it all.

The museum is definitely worth the trip.  There’s so much of New York State history to learn and it’s done well there, making the learning fun for children and adults.