American Museum of Natural History Review

Recently, on a trip to the New York metro area, my wife and I wanted to plan a day in the city that the whole family would enjoy.

Often when I'm in New York alone I'll call one of my older daughters and we'll spend the day touring the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  I love those moments when we share our love and thoughts about some of the world's finest pieces of art.

But on this trip my 11 year-old daughter was going to be the center of attention and we felt that this wouldn't yet be her thing.

What to do?

It's hard to go wrong spending a day (at least) roaming the American Museum of Natural History.  That's what we decided to do.  And, of course or older daughters decided to take a day off to join us.

For me, the AMNH has always been about the dinosaurs.  Sure, I enjoyed so much more, but I would always come back to the dinosaurs

The exhibits on Mammals, Reptiles and the Origins of Man are all incredible, but it's hard for anything to compare with the skeleton of a creature that walked the earth 250 million years ago.  My daughter seemed to agree.

Entering the Hall of Dinosaurs I could see her eyes bug out of her head staring at what I was taught to believe was a Brontasaurus.  Could anything this large have ever really walked the earth?

My daughter to have some fun at my expense.  She asked if this was the same Brontasaurus they had when I was her age.  I assured her it was.  "Wow, that thing really is old!"

I was happy to see that as science has discovered more about these wonders, the exhibits have been updated to reflect the newer information.

Surely, when I was growing up no one thought to relate a T-Rex with a sparrow.  But times have changed.

A couple of disappointments

In walking some of the Halls, particularly those of early man and the great mammals I got the impression that the dioramas had not changed since I was a boy.  There were cases where I would swear that the backgrounds had not been redone in all these years.  This disappointed me.

The Cafeteria disappointed me as well as did the gift shop which has turned into a store in which to buy plush toys!

I remember when you could easily find fossil kits there.

And don't forget the Planeterium

My wife and daughter decided to take in the Collision of the Cosmos show at the connected Hadyn Planetarium.  For one reason or another I took a pass.  Both of them thought the updated Planetarium worthy of two thumbs up.  I swear though, when I was a kid the show seemed a lot longer than the current 30 minutes.  Somehow I'm going to talk my daughter or wife into writing a piece on it.

My Viewpoint

Until you've visited the American Museum of Modern History, you're missing a really big chunk of the value of your trip to New York.  This is not an excursion to miss whether you're with young children or not.  Go see it.