Especially gratifying has been the attendance on
holidays, which shows that the interest in the Museum is by no means
confined to those who have plenty of leisure. On Thanksgiving Day 800
names were registered, Christmas 932, New Year's 732, Decoration Day
850. For the benefit of the mill-operatives and other laborers who form
the largest portion of the population of Norwich and the adjoining
towns, to whom the Museum might do a world of good, we sincerely hope
the day is not far distant when the building may be open at least a
couple of hours each Sunday. The experience of the Boston Museum of Fine
Arts in Sunday opening has been an unqualified success, and we wish that
Norwich, as well as our own city, might profit by it. In Boston, we are
told, the average number of admissions during the Sunday hours has
reached as high as 1,000 per hour, and of these probably four-fifths are
common workmen with their families.
These facts and figures regarding the Slater Memorial Museum are
valuable only so far as they go. They show that the first problem of a
museum--to interest the public at large--has there been solved
successfully. More than that is not to be looked for yet. The ultimate
good which the institution will accomplish can be but imperfectly
manifested in one generation. It is from the children now growing up,
from their children and their children's children, that the deeper
results are to be expected.
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