| Show NEW YORK HISTORY FROM EARLY DAYS museum groups vividly recall the past among the tattered letters odd maps aud and prints time darkened portraits and other fragmentary memorabilia ora or which line the walls of the new museum of the city of new york there runs rung the series of model mod groups to in which dwight franklin and ned J 3 burns have recaptured the long past of the greatest city of the world they aro are delicate little panoramas ns beautifully constructed ted and finely modeled and breathing a sudden life and vitality into the dead relics about them as they repeat the veritable scenes amid which those old letters passed or those quaint dresses were worn peter Stuyvesan ts sword looks simply like something in a museum until near it one sees the governor govern br himself fully as aa vivid as life if only about one tenth as large storming over colonel Cart cartwrights wrights demand for surrender while the seventeenth century sunshine lies hes placidly upon the ramparts of lieuw amsterdam fo fort rt outside the door well the fort has lain burled for many years somewhere beneath the foundations of lower broadway Bron dway peter stuyvesant Is as dead as a doornail door nall and so Is the pleasant bucolic life of the little outpost of dutch empire which once occupied what was once the tip of manhattan in the model those times are as alive as last nights supper club so are the pleasant blue waters and wooded slopes of the east bast river so much pleasanter Dleasant plea santer er than today as they are seen through the windows window s of the beekman mansion while general ilowe interrupted with wineglass la in hand and a mot upon his ups tosses the irritated glance of authority over his sti to see what the guards have brought in its an infernal young rebel suspected of espionage name of nathan hale one almost hears the voices and one suddenly understands a lot about the american revolution alive too are the waterfront crowds under the long jib booms on south street or the indians three centuries earlier in their encampment at inwood these models are an essential and fascinating part of the new exhibit something which distinguishes it from those of other museums they give an incomparably better idea of the times they portray than do for example the models of old london in the great london museum and they suggest how wonderful will be the record which this museum will contain when time has enriched its collections and broadened their scope to cover the countless fields of new yorks life and activities down to the present time As yet of course there are many lacunae lac the ile contemporary I 1 scene Is hardly touched some types ot of exhibit may prove difficult to acquire new yorks growth for example ll 11 hag Is been so swift and so BO destructive as to leave few of tho the old shot shop fronts old 8 igns glens and utensils pieces ot of furniture and paneling which are important items in the london collection but tho the Is such stick a fine one offering so BO many possibilities that money and support for expansion must surely be forthcoming one hopes that good slices of it will lie be spent on further work from mr F franklin ran in and an mr r burns new ew york herald tribune |
