Barnum's American Museum: Before the Circus...

Barnum's American Museum was in New York on the intersection of Ann and Broadway.This was an area Whitman lived in at a time and went to often. Whitman interviewed Barnum for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle on this museum and went into the museum at least twice. Whitman, being himself, found the people that attended the museum far more interesting than the displays that were constructed to view. He sat a chair in front of a window, back turned to the museum and watched the New Yorkers shuffle and rush by.
 After sitting in this chair, just watching he came to a conclusion and "he divides the scene into three groups: omnibuses and their drivers, fashionable women, and imitators of European aristocracy" He probably went through many thought to get to that.
 Although, he could sit and watch the people that came to sit and stare at displays, was also in deep appreciation for museums and the thoughts that they can conjure up in people. Walt was interviewed and says,

 “there is probably nothing in New York more deeply interesting” than the

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle Building

museum and recommends it as “a place to go when one would ponder and evolve
great thoughts” (Whitman 1936: 40)

                                                             







I also enjoy doing this at crowded places. A very fond pastime I call, people watching. The thoughts you can think up when watching all the people you share this planet with.
The other day while walking I watched a kid running across campus and he stopped because he heard something drop from his backpack. It was a pen, he stopped to go back but he was obviously in a hurry and looked at the pen with disdain, shuffled his feet toward the place he was suppose to be and looked like he made the rash decision to leave the pen on the ground. Poor kid looked so torn between picking  up his pen or being where he was suppose to be on time. He would have to continue his life without this pen. It must have been the only pen he had on him, his very last pen, he could have had this pen for a long time and grew fond of it.
After many thoughts going through my head, as to why he would be so attached to a pen, or how it could make him late to simply bend and pick up this pen, I finally realized that I knew this feeling. The feeling of being torn between a tedious decision and having to make it quickly. Now I have a way to describe it,

"Its like dropping your last pen on the ground while rushing to catch a bus"
This may not be an evolved thought right now, but it sparked other thoughts, and it may very well lead to a great one.









Whitman uses metaphors in his works and museums were able to

(http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1117&context=libraryscience)