A horse of a different color: The New England Carousel Museum

I am afriad of heights and I get dizzy easily so as you can probably imagine, amusement parks don't hold a lot of interest for me. But there is one ride I will always take: The carousel. Maybe it's my love of Mary Poppins, or the fact that this is the only kind of horse I'll ever be able to ride, but there's something that I love about their intricately designed flanks and calming rhythm of their "trot" as they make their way along to the old-timey organ music.

When Marvin first moved to Bristol we saw signs in the area for the "Carousel Museum." It seems pretty self-explanatory but one day curiosity got the better of us and we took a little drive to check it out. I'm glad we did! The museum itself is a pretty modest affair. It's housed in a restored factory building that also houses The Museum of Fire History (a neat collection of fighterfighter equipment), and The Greek Museum of Art and History (which, at the time we visited the museum several years ago was still in the planning stages).



There's one main room which holds the collection, a dizzying display of carousel horses of every type. You really get an appreciation for the artistry, whimsy, and just plain work that goes into making the horses. The tour includes the history of the carousel, the design and production of the horses, information about the actual horses in the collection, and plenty of fun facts. For instance, did you know that only one side of the horse - the side that faces out to the public - is decorated? It's called the "romance side" of the horse. There are examples of other types of carousel animals, like giraffes, and we even saw an exhibit of modern carousel animals made by artists. I loved the dolphin with the mermaid on his side.



The museum also houses a workshop where they restore battered and broken carousel animals and is also in charge of the restoration of three municipal carousels in Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. We're lucky enough to live near one of them, the historic Bushnell Park Carousel, in Hartford.

I absolutely recommend visiting the New England Carousel Musuem. It's interesting, a great rainy day activity and cheap as chips to boot!


Phots of the New England Carousel Museum courtesy of yourFAVORITEmartian. Click the link for the whole set!