Carly Senning
Newswriting II 2nd Place

Sloths, Fossils, Flesh-Eaters, Oh My!

Hold on to your personal belongings and get ready to blast into the past 500 million years ago.  Skyscrapers will melt, glaciers will freeze and giant sloths will begin scrounging around as if extinction wasn’t even a word yet.

The time portal on University of Iowa’s campus is still open to the public and sending people back in time every day.  If interested, it’s the Museum of Natural History located on the corner of Jefferson and Clinton Street.  The stone building looks no older than 20 years, but is in fact the second oldest museum west of the Mississippi river.

After climbing up the worn ivory-colored steps into the museum, greeters will reward you with a smile and plenty of directions and advice.  The homey-feeling gift shop is nothing complicated and distracting; just a few glossy coffee mugs, nature-related books and memorabilia dedicated to their mascot; a giant ice age sloth.

“The prehistoric sloth by far was the coolest part of the museum,” Courtney Cambell exclaims with wide eyes.  “I’ve never seen that anywhere else.”  Throughout the whole museum, “buzz” about the giant sloth echoes off the walls and employees talk highly of it.  The elephant-sized mammal’s fossils were discovered in 2002.

“It’s not the most significant, but it’s our mascot.  Everything in this museum is equally special,” says four-year employee Benjamin Daniels.

The first floor consists of the prehistoric ages in Iowa starting in the Devonian time period.  With the first swift turn into the exhibit, a massive, open-mouthed fish glows blue as if it’s actually alive in a fish tank coming at you.  This excitement and anticipation grows more and more the deeper into the museum you go.
After that floor has been explored, two floors up supplies even more history.  To the left is a bird exhibit filled with more than 1,000 specimens including the awkwardly fluffy do-do bird, one of the few able to actually be displayed.  The room consists of glass case after glass case of life-size birds.  They look so realistic that one would think they flew down to rest right in front of you.  Near the end of this exhibit they have an ostrich displayed at its full height of seven feet.  This exhibit had everywhere from warblers to condors and is impressively developed and diverse.

To the right side is a vastly large auditorium in which leads you to the mammal exhibit.  Once the other side is reached, the doors swing open, revealing a bobcat stalking prey on a rocky cliff.  Hanging from the ceiling is the skeleton of a right whale, which is 50 feet long.  Prehistoric animals once again show up and impress just as much as before.  “Flesh-eaters” inhabit a corner and force eyes to widen with marvel.  The experience is overwhelming, to say the least.
The museum has had a steady flow of people come in and out every day.  It’s also free and a great way to pass time in an affordable manner.  They are also working on a new section in the mammal exhibit with more modern themes in mind.

“I usually don’t have fun at museums but this was more than fun,” Cambell states.  “I want to go back already!”