Are museum boring?

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Are museums boring? I don't think so!

Museums are often very boring places to visit, but a few years ago some big museums started to get more visitors, especially young people. Why? There was a series of three very funny Hollywood films called Night at the Museum.

In the films, the exhibits at the museums come alive at night! People started to get more interested in history. They wanted to visit the museums from the films.

1.American Museum of Natural History, New York

This is where they made the first film. The year after the film, twenty percent more people visited the museum. There were more than five million visitors. They wanted to see exhibits like the statue of Theodore Roosevelt, the US president from the film. The museum first opened in 1869. Roosevelt’s father started it. It’s a wonderful place. They’ve got the skeleton of a very old woman - she’s over three million years old! And there are very big African elephants, lots of dinosaurs and a blue whale that is more than twenty-eight metres long!

2.British Museum, London

They filmed the third film in London. This museum opened in 1759. It was the first free museum in the UK and it’s still free today. It’s got more than seven million things to see. There are sculptures from Egypt and Italy, like in the film, and the oldest exhibit is nearly two million years old. It’s a stone - one of the first human tools. More than six million people visit this museum every year. Because of the film, they are hoping to get more and more visitors.

Maybe the exhibits don’t come alive, but they’re certainly not boring!