Flat Stanley came for a visit (Part III)!

If you missed our previous posts about Flat Stanley, he came for a visit last week, and we had quite a bit of fun!  This is Stanley's third, and final, blog post about his visit...  Read Part I HERE, and Part II HERE.  And, now, here's Stanley to tell you about the rest of his trip to New York City...

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Hello again! It's me, Flat Stanley! I've left New York City, and am on my way towards Arizona, and then Germany, but I wanted to make sure I finish telling you all about my adventures in New York!  After visiting Time's Square, going to the theater, seeing the Statue of Liberty from afar, and so on, my hosts decided to take me to the American Museum of Natural History!  Have you seen the movie "Night at the Museum"?  Guess where that is supposed to take place??? At the American Museum of Natural History in New York City!  Now, the movie wasn't actually filmed there, but it was still really cool to visit!  According to Wikipedia, the movie was mostly filmed on a sound stage somewhere else, with only the exterior shots of the building being the real deal.  However, several items and characters in the movie version of the museum have real counterparts that we were able to check out...

The American Museum of Natural History is right on the edge of Central Park.

We started our visit with mammals.  These are Indian rhinoceroses.

This guy is a hoolock gibbon.  From the sign: "Gibbons are the smallest as well as the most arboreal of the anthropoid (man-like) apes.  Though capable of walking upright, they move chiefly by swinging with long arms from branch to branch, a distinctive form of locomotion known as brachiation.  Gibbons travel trough the trees in bands often numbering 50 to 100 individuals.  They have a distinctive and powerful voice.  Their diet includes fruit, leaves, insects, spiders and birds' eggs."

Then we moved on to exhibits about the early people of Asia.  This diorama is of the Koryak people.  From the sign: "The Koryak live in northeastern Siberia, a place of extreme cold.  One main group live inland and depend upon herding reindeer for subsistence; the other, shown here, live along the coast and subsist by hunting sea mammals and fishing.  Our knowledge of shelter and clothing during the Ice Age is limited, but we can be certain that prehistoric man adapted to the climate much as have the Koryak.  Their partly subterranean houses have multipurpose roofs which not only protect the house from burial in snow but provide a storage area and a reservoir for snow to be used for drinking."

We saw a lot of really interesting masks.  This one gave me nightmares!

This diorama is really neat!

We saw some Japanese art and displays.

These are tiny little Japanese carvings.  They were a lot smaller than me!

 

This samurai display was really cool!  From the sign: "The warrior caste has always had a high place in Japanese society.  Traditions of bravery, martial skills, personal honor and loyalty have so marked this caste that its name, samurai - one who serves, is known throughout the world.  Samurai origins go back to prehistoric times, but the warriors heyday in Japan came during the medieval period (1192-1568), when feudal lords created armies and obtained their loyalty by martial codes (bushido). The Samurai are the subject of many legends and stories.  As shown here, their arms were often created by find craftsmen, who molded and embellished the weapons in which the Samurai took extreme pride."

 

I think I look pretty good in this hat!

 

With my host's mom.

With JP.

This looks like a moose skeleton, but it is actually Megaloceros, which "...may be the largest deer ever to have lived. It belongs to the group called artiodactyls - hoofed mammals that usually have an even number of toes.  Many also have horns or antlers...  Generally, only male artiodacytls have antlers.  In living deer, they are used during the mating season for wrestling with other males and attracting females, and then are shed."

A bear!

I rode on the back of a glyptodont!  Not really, but it sure looks like it, doesn't it?  From the signs: "Glyptodonts had a thick outer shell and skullcap formed of fused bony plates.  This protective armor helped shield the plant-eating glyptodonts from meat-eating predators."

 

Guess who this guy is behind me???  That's right - T-rex!  Tyrannosaurus rex means "tyrant reptile". From the signs: "Although Tyrannosaurus is one of the most familiar dinosaurs, its skeletons are quite rare.  Fever than 15 partial specimens have been collected.  Tyrannosaurus was the largest and most fearsome carnivore of all time.  The arms of Tyrannosaurus rex were relatively tiny.  Scientists thought that tyrannosaur hands had 3 fingers as the hands of Allosaurus did, until specimens were discovered which showed that all advanced tyrannosaurs had only 2 fingers on each hand."

This little guys are so cute!

Recognize this guy?  He didn't say anything during our visit.  Good thing, because we didn't have any gum for him, and didn't really want him to call us dumb-dumbs either!

Just hanging out at the museum...

Pit-stop!

 

After the museum, we walked through the park grounds.  The park immediately around the museum is  named after Theodore Roosevelt.  He was the 26th president of the United States, from 1901 to 1909.  Roosevelt's interest in history and the natural world developed during his childhood when he often had to stay home due to severe asthma.  During that time he studied natural history, and feel in love with the subject.  He went on to attend Harvard University where he studied biology.  Before Harvard, and due to his asthma and physical weakness, Roosevelt was homeschooled! Roosevelt spent several years in North and South Dakota as well, and was a true cowboy!  After his time in the Dakotas, he returned to his childhood home of New York City where he had a career with the New York Police Department, and then he went on to develop his life in politics, eventually becoming the President of the United States.

The main entrance to the museum. We went in through a side entrance because that's where all the signs we saw pointed!

Theodore Roosevelt statue in front of the museum.