Rubber Ducky You're The One

Title: “Barduck Obama”

Date: January 13, 2012 “National Rubber Ducky Day”

Material: Rubber, Vinyl-Plastic, Acrylic Paint

Creator: Various Toy Makers/PTM Curatorial Department

Collection: Contemporary Toys

 “Barduck Obama” the Barack Obama duck is in “National Rubber Ducky Day” exhibit in the River Adventure exhibition at the Please Touch Museum.  It is the museum’s most popular exhibit ever.  The exhibit opened for National Rubber Ducky Day on January 13, 2012 and staff gave out rubber ducky souvenirs that day. The Obama duck is only one of five hundred thirty six rubber ducks on display.  The exhibit contains other famous ducks including Mr. T duck Elvis duck. Many of the toy ducks were purchased, but some were donated by two members of the Collectors Society for Rubber Duckies.  Museum staff members also donated some ducks.

Rubber Ducks became popular during the 1970’s when Ernie, a character on the popular kids show Sesame Place, sang about his ducky in the bathtub. The ducks are also a popular collectors’ item around the world and worldwide Rubber Duck derbies are held in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia.

Rubber ducks are hugely popular and interest in the exhibit spans a wide margin.  Children love the duckies as well as collectors and several generations of Americans have seen Ernie sing the "Rubber Ducky" song on Sesame Street. Barduck Obama is of particular interest especially given that 2012 is an election year. 

I could imagine some visitors might not think that every duck in the display is appropriate.  There is a "Swat Duck" and "Dead Duck" that floats upside down. Some others may find it disrepectful to portray the president as a duck.

I disagree and think that the popularlity of the ducks could help experience guides and parents explain the election in a fun and understandable way for small children. I only wish there was a "Mitt Romduck" in the display as well.  The PTM could have a race of the two ducks  through the River Adventure exhibition on Election Day!

 

 

 

 

 

Baby Batu

Title: Batu

Material: Big brown eyes, big hands, big feet, orange fur

Creator: Tua and Sugi

Year: 2009

 

Batu is a three year old Sumatran Orangutan that was born at the Philadelphia Zoo. She is the first baby of orangutans, Tua and Sugi. The Philadelphia Zoo was the first zoo to have an orangutan born in captivity in 1928.

Batu is an important symbol.  She is the centerpiece of the Zoo’s Year of the Orangutans.  There will be themed events throughout 2012 that focus on saving the orangutans of Sumatra and their habitat. This includes the Zoo’s exhibition Train of the Lorax. This program has been structured around the Lorax and Batu to educate visitors about the deforestation of Sumatra by companies harvesting palm oil.  

Batu was not “acquired,” she was born.  The Zoo did acquire Batu’s mother, Tua, from the Atlanta Zoo as a mate for Sugi.  Sugi had a previous mate, but he did not seem interested in her.  When the Philadelphia Zoo acquired Tua, she and Sugi hit it off immediately and Batu was born shortly thereafter.

Batu can be seen in the primate house with her parents.  During our visit, she was outside swinging around a metal rigging while her mother was lying in a hammock. Sugi was inside playing with a blanket. A Zoo staff member, Mary Bailey, pointed out to us that the Zoo does not have reflective glass allowing visitors to interact with the primates.  Sugi could see us through the glass just as well as we could see him. Batu can also be seen on educational panels throughout the Zoo as part of the Trail of the Lorax conservation exhibition. She is featured on the panels asking visitors to sign a leaf of gratitude thanking companies who use sustainable palm oil such as Proctor and Gamble and Pepsi Co. Soon, visitors will be able to see Batu traveling around the Zoo grounds in the Treetop Trail.

Most visitors to the zoo want to see the baby animals and Batu is no exception. Last February, I visited the Zoo for Valentine’s Day. The Zoo had a holiday program for couples that included hot cocoa and a private tour. The tour guide took us around the zoo and showed us all the young animals and explained about different species reproduction.  I don’t specifically remember seeing Batu, but the popularity of this tour (it was outside in the cold and still sold-out) confirmed how popular the young animals are.

Companies guilty of deforestation and using unsustainable palm oil would be opposed to the Trail of the Lorax exhibition and the Zoo’s involvement with the UNLESS Campaign to thank other companies that plan to use nothing but sustainable palm oil by 2015.  This is bad for their business and promotes their competitors.  It is part of the Zoo’s mission to get the visitors to learn at least one thing at the Zoo and follow through with conservation at home. After visitors engage with the exhibit and campaign by signing thank you leaves, visitors will leave the Zoo and remember what companies they could thank and which one they couldn’t. Visitors interested in helping the orangutans will be more likely to purchase products from companies that joined the UNLESS Campaign.

The Trail of the Lorax exhibition is extremely well planned and implemented. Since ours was an adult tour, I would be interested in seeing how guides take students and young children through the Zoo and specifically through the primate house. If Batu and her parents are active, it would give guides a great opportunity to get children engaged in learning about orangutans, palm oil, deforestation, and conversation. Being close to Batu allows them to make a real life connection to a living thing rather than reading about these topics in a book or watching a video about these topics in class. 

For more information about Orangutans, the UNLESS Campaign, or Trail of the Lorax click here.

Little Monsters

 

Title (Year): A Sign on Rosie’s Door (1960), In the Night Kitchen (1970), Outside Over There (1981), Bumble-Ardy (2011)

Material: Paper, Ink, Water Color

Creator: Maurice Sendak

Collection: Maurice Sendak Collection, Permanent Collection of the Rosenbach Museum and Library

As a member of the generation called “millennials” (those born in the late 1980’s and 1990’s), I grew up reading and looking at the pictures in Where the Wild Things Are. Like most people my age, and even my parents’ ages, I was a huge fan.  I saw the Spike Jonze film adaption the weekend it was released in movie theaters. People gave me copies of both the soundtrack and the DVD as gifts.  Until I visited the Rosenbach Museum and Library on October 3^rd, I did not know Maurice Sendak had ever written or illustrated anything else.  Even after watching Sendak on The Colbert Report, I didn’t realize how prolific the man had been.

The books I listed above are only a few examples of Sendak’s work that I had been unfamiliar with before my visit to the Rosenbach. Maurice Sendak has influenced both illustrators and children’s book authors for over fifty years and these works were just as influential to Children’s Literature as Wild Things.  The Rosenbach has been a repository for Sendak’s work since the 1970’s and agreed to have his work exhibited year round although the exhibitions rotated in order to conserve the materials.  A variety of Sendak’s work, from final illustrations, cut and pasted iterations and his only mural (the Chertoff Mural painted for a friend’s children) are currently on display in the Maurice Sendak Gallery in memory of the artist. His work is also on display as part of the exhibition Maurice Sendak and Stephen Colbert Interviews, Objects…and Poles!

Maurice Sendak’s career spanned over sixty-five years, so almost anyone who was read or read a children’s book during that time would be interested in seeing the exhibition. It is particularly appealing for parents to bring their children to see. It is a way for adults to engage with children in a museum that is not designed specifically for children. I would not recommend the exhibition for elementary school groups simply because of the limited space and lack of interest a large group of small children would have in the manuscript, rare books, and antiques that are also part of the Rosenbach collection. That does not mean that Language Arts and Literature teachers could not use the Sendak exhibition as a gateway to entice students in a visit to a museum that would also include seeing the works of Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll, Bram Stoker, and Daniel Defoe, just to name a few. The inclusion of elements donated by Stephen Colbert would also aid in engaging high school and college students with the objects in the museum as many would be familiar with the comedian and his television show.

As Assistant Program Director, Farrar Fitzgerald, mentioned during our class tour last week, not everyone understands why the Rosenbach would exhibit the Colbert objects (empty beer bottles, pens, a sandwich wrapper and deli receipt), but it is because of the elements ties to Sendak and to pop culture.  The audience that does not “get it” (the Pole exhibition) should not let that deter them from visiting the Rosenbach and experiencing the myriad other works of Sendak, especially if like me, Wild Things and I Am A Pole were the only works they had ever known.

Sittin' by the fire

Title:Fireside Chats Year: “1942” Material: Wood, plastic, glass, metal Creator: NCC Collection: Main Exhibition

In a small alcove of in the outer ring of the National Constitution Center Main Exhibition sits a cathedral radio from the 1940’s.  I’m not sure if the radio is real or just a mock-up.  It sits on a mantle surrounded by black and white photos; possibly of the couple’s marriage and their adult children.  The scene is meant to let visitors experience one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “Fireside Chats,” this one is from February 23, 1942. The “experience room” is situated between the displays of items from FDR's administration (a Social Security card, the President's fedora, a Japanese plane propeller) and those of his second Vice President and successor Harry S. Truman (Truman's Hawaiian shirt). There is a transcript available for visitors to read with text from several of FDR's broadcasts.  There is also a small descriptive panel (on the visitor's left hand side when looking at the mantle) that explains that the visitor is listening to FDR's actual broadcast from February 23, 1942. 

The fireside chat display was constructed by the NCC to allow the core audience of students to experience what it was like to listen to the news via radio (Radio was "king" in the 1940's) rather than getting their information from television or the internet. I believe this was meant to be an immersive experience for the visitor, and although I enjoyed it, I can see why other visitors might be confused or "not get it." For example, if someone were to walk by and look in without stepping close enough, he or she would only see a mock living room from the early twentieth century without hearing Roosevelt's voice. Some visitors to the NCC might walk past without even realizing this is part of the Main Exhibition. (Other visitors might miss it because they are so overwhelmed by the Main Exhibition or simply be more interested in the traditional artifacts on display.)

A visit to the NCC is intended to be a learning experience rather than a leisurely stroll past some artifacts. (This is partial because so many exhibits are interactive and because the NCC only has a small collection of artifacts that it owns.) The fireside chat experience could be more fully developed. At this point, it looks like a replica.  The lighting could be dimmed to make the room look more comfortable and inviting. An artificial electric fireplace could also be added to make the room look more realistic and warm (it should be "fire-side" after all.)  As most Americans listened to Roosevelt in the evening while seated, a chair would also be beneficial for visitors while adding to the experience.  All of these items would help draw visitor attention to this space.  It would be a respite for visitors from the sensory stimulation of the Main Exhibit. Currently, the recording is of only one radio broadcast, however, to improve the visitor experience and interaction visitors could chose what broadcast is played from a list of options.

This exhibit gave me an idea for a lesson that could be used by High School Social Studies and Language Arts teachers studying WWII. First, students could write about or discuss the last news program they watched on television. This would be followed by a close reading of one of FDR's broadcasts (the broadcast that plays in the NCC when students visit).  During a trip to the NCC, the students could sit and listen to the broadcast as if they were in their living room in 1942.  Students would write an essay comparing and contrasting this experience with watching a news program on television that evening.  As a follow-up activity, the next day after discussing the essays as a class, students would then write a script from a news item (provided by the teacher) as if it were being delivered over the radio and present these to the class.