American Museum of Natural History Archives

Lost World

November 14, 2025November 13, 2025 photog Current Events, photog's Corner, Science American Museum of Natural History, New York City, Theodore Roosevelt

The “Age of Mamdani” is upon New York City. And anyone who frequently reads this site knows that I expect the bottom to drop out of the city in a way that will make the previous Democrat mayors’ terms look positively idyllic by comparison.

But as much as I indulge in seeming schadenfreude, it’s gallows humor. New York City used to be a world-class city. Even in its ruins there still exist some absolutely astonishing resources hidden among the squalor.

I’ll say something. When I lived in New York my favorite indoor space was the American Museum of Natural History. Ever since I was a kid barely old enough to walk I would wander around mesmerized by the dinosaurs and all the other creatures to be found in that magical place.

American Museum of Natural History, New York City, Sony NEX 5N, Sony 24mm F\1.8 APSC lens

And almost as fascinating was the Hall of African Mammals. With the huge exhibit of a small herd of African Elephants and the other monumental creatures like the rhinoceroses a small boy could be transported to another world.

But now this incomparable citadel of knowledge and wonder will be held hostage by people who hate the culture that produced it and made it into a legacy for all New Yorkers. Already they removed the statue of Teddy Roosevelt that had stood for a century in front of the entrance. Its motif with the “great white hunter” on horseback walking with the third world natives in their primitive costumes enraged the George Floyd crowd. So it had to go.

Next thing you know some exhibit of primitive aborigines will outrage some woke group and that exhibit will be banned.

And after that someone will decide that there just aren’t enough Palestinian exhibits or somewhere on a sign there is some vestigial reference to Christianity. Probably someone will be triggered by a date still using B.C. or A.D. and more scrubbing will be needed or some other facet of third world life will need to be reinforced for the good of the public.

I guess I don’t anticipate dinosaurs becoming controversial but I guarantee something in the African exhibits will offend someone in the New York African American community and the wholesale purge will begin.

And when push comes to shove, I think I will feel worse about the loss of the American Museum of Natural History than about the whole rest of the city and its inhabitants put together. I know that’s an awful thing to say. But it’s true. I guess murdering magic is a terrible thing to the little kid that’s still inside of me.

Of Dinosaurs and Decline

August 26, 2021August 26, 2021 photog Current Events, OCF American Museum of Natural History, black rioting, BLM, Theodore Roosevelt

I have a young grandson who is fascinated by dinosaurs. I told him that if the rioting in New York City subsides I’d like to bring him to the American Museum of Natural History and let him see their dinosaur collection. And that got me thinking.

As I’ve mentioned previously a culture needs its myths. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries the center of the American Myth was New York City. The rich and powerful built a modern-day Rome. Monumental buildings and cultural centers were built and artefacts and art works were collected from around the world. Even an enormous garden called Central Park was built in the center of the island, the most expensive real estate in the world, to provide an oasis from the concrete jungle that was built to house the business hub of a modern empire.

And from my point of view, the crown jewel was the American Museum of Natural History. The Museum was essentially free to residents of New York City. You were allowed to pay any amount you wanted for admission even a penny. Out in front was a larger-than-life sculpture of Teddy Roosevelt on a horse with African and Indian bearers escorting him on one of his expeditions. And inside was assembled a spectacular collection of natural history specimens that would fuel the imagination of anyone with a speck of imagination or curiosity.

There were magnificent dinosaur skeletons. Specimens of Tyrannosaurus rex, Allosaurus, Brontosaurus (now renamed Apatosaurus to satisfy the boring needs of pedagogy), Triceratops, Stegosaurus and Duck-billed dinosaurs called Edmontosaurus annectens are on display in spacious halls that allow the spectators to walk around these marvels. In addition to the dinosaurs there are skeletons of wooly mammoths, mastodons, wooly rhinoceros, giant ground sloths and other prehistoric mammals. There are also halls filled with the preserved bodies of mammals and birds from Africa, Asia and the Americas displayed in dioramas that used painted backgrounds and other materials like native vegetation to simulate the animals in their native habitat. Scenes of lions, rhinos, tigers and elephants provide remarkable vistas. Other halls include collections of gemstones, artefacts of aboriginal peoples from six continents and even a life size model of a blue whale are on display.

The museum with its heroic statue of Roosevelt is itself an artefact of a civilization at its peak of wealth, strength and confidence. Everything fits into the myth of American, and by extension, Western civilization expanding and illuminating the world. We gathered these specimens from the four corners of the Earth and we had studied and determined their meaning. We were the masters of the planet and we were confidently stepping into the future. There was even a planetarium that would teach our children of their place in the universe and our eventual explorations beyond Earth.

So, in 2021 the statue of Teddy Roosevelt was removed from the entrance of the museum. Soon I’m sure that roving bands of BLM rioters will loot the museum and sell the dinosaur bones to crack cocaine dealers as trophy crack pipes. Our myth about Teddy Roosevelt as the great white hunter is no different than Rome’s Julius Caesar and the Huns’ Atilla. Not everything in the myth is true but the myth fits the needs of a people. When you give up your myths it means you’ve given up on your reason to live as a people. That’s what we’re seeing.

Maybe I should bring my grandson to see the Beijing Museum of Natural History’s dinosaur collection. It would probably be safer and less depressing.

24FEB2021 – OCF Update – Something Constructive

February 24, 2021February 24, 2021 photog Photography American Museum of Natural History, OCF Update, photography, Sony NEX 5N

I decided today was a good day to do some fiction writing. I’ve been neglecting it during the run up to the Dementia Joe inauguration and since there wasn’t anything really compelling in the news I figured I’d wait until later to put up a post. I have a post in progress for the end of the hummingbird Photo of the Day series but I’ll attach something interesting from the archive just to make this worthwhile.