AMNH visits

The Dinosaur Wing

I’ve always been impressed by the dinosaur wing at the Museum of Natural History and this time I tried to pay special attention to the display, but I kept getting distracted and wanting to draw skeletons.  I noticed they actually made it clear when things were cast or if they were real.  I was surprised only 48% of the Tyrannosaurus skeleton was real, and I wondered why the skull on the skeleton was fake, and the real one was sitting on the floor separate from the body. Perhaps they wanted to display the real skull at eyelevel for better observation.  I also wondered about why they wrote directly on the skull, when it seems like it would cause damage, but on Friday’s tour I found out that it was the only way to catalogue the bones, which I can understand when there are so many bones to keep track of for just one animal, and now the writing can be removed but still the fact that they used to write and permanently mark the skulls is a bit shocking to me.

The bird section had a lot of explanations with illustrations and skeletons showing similarities and progression.  There was the cast of a giant prehistoric bird’s skeleton displayed with Charles R. Knight’s drawing of a Paleocene that looked really menacing.  I thought it was funny and odd that they had seagulls hanging from the ceiling, flying through.  I liked the interactive touch screens all over the exhibit, and they provided useful images and background that offered a further understanding.

Behind the Scenes

I was astonished by the meticulous systems of organization at AMNH, and I couldn’t believe when Paul said specimens were basically in piles before the catalogue system.  And it became so much easier to catalogue with the technology of an electronic database.  I was impressed by amount of equipment and careful climate control that was required to keep things sufficiently cared for, organized and catalogued by number in sections like a library. It sort of made me sad to think that only 2.6% of the collection was on display at the museum, and it really made me want to see everything.  Each continent had 10,000 square feet of storage and its own curator.  They had enough material to fill several museums, and I wondered how much of the collection never gets seen publicly, and how much of it gets accessed by visiting researchers.  I was impressed that they were working on digitally archiving the collection so that more is accessible online.

It was interesting to me that the only growth in the collection was in ethnography, since expeditions are no longer allowed to bring excavated objects out of their countries of origin, and in the country these objects become federal property so there is no new archaeology.  Of course with physical anthropology it’s illegal to take objects like human remains from their country of origin too.  The Museum has been build upon previous ideologies and ethical standards, which made me wonder could the Museum have existed under the rules of today?  It’s difficult to think about in the context of our time, but the Museum used to be able to do things differently, and I don’t think it would be possible to obtain such a vast, worldly collection unless it was seized or acquired before these laws existed. 

Also it was funny to hear that Paul agreed with our conclusion that the culture halls are outdated, limited, with insufficient representation, and desperately need to be redone.