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St. Louis Museum Offers Thrills, Chills, and Lawsuits

Posted by samzenpus on from the everything-fun-is-dangerous dept.

theodp writes "Despite the whiff of danger, or perhaps because of it, the WSJ reports that the City Museum is one of St. Louis's most popular attractions. Housed in a 10-story brick building, the City Museum shows none of the restraint or quiet typical of most museums. It boasts a five-story jungle gym with two real-life jets kids can climb on, an enclosed Monster Slide that drops riders the length of three staircases, and a rooftop Ferris wheel. Sure, there are the occasional severed fingers and skull fractures, but museum founder Bob Cassilly contends that it is as safe as it can be without being a bore. 'They [lawyers] are taking the fun out of life,' says Cassilly, adding that 'when you have millions of people do something, something's going to happen no matter what you do.'"

32 of 140 comments (clear)

  1. Scary indeed! by JDSalinger · · Score: 4, Informative

    I have climbed through their jungle gym and I must say it is quite scary. You definitely feel right on the edge of safe. Yet it stands out like no other "museum" I've been to. As such, it is quite provocative and truly unique, but contains minimal content and only satiates perhaps an hour of curiosity.

    1. Re:Scary indeed! by DIplomatic · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I have climbed through their jungle gym and I must say it is quite scary. You definitely feel right on the edge of safe. Yet it stands out like no other "museum" I've been to. As such, it is quite provocative and truly unique, but contains minimal content and only satiates perhaps an hour of curiosity.

      "...only satiates perhaps an hour of curiosity" Only an hour??? I went there with a group of friends as a senior in college and it was the most fun I've had in my adult life! We spent about 6 hours running, climbing, sliding, jumping, and generally laughing like children. It's one of the few places where there are no rules to be followed, and the whole point is to remember what it was like to climb on everything.

    2. Re:Scary indeed! by Moryath · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Anybody remember when "personal responsibility" meant something?

      "Waah, I paid admission, then went down a slide and didn't pay attention to what I was doing and injured myself so I'm suing you for $$$."

      Kill all the lawyers. First step towards reclaiming society. Second step: reclaim the jury system so it's no longer twelve retards who think the defendant has unlimited funds and "can afford" to just pay out in Lawsuit Lotto.

    3. Re:Scary indeed! by Thelasko · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You definitely feel right on the edge of safe. Yet it stands out like no other "museum" I've been to.

      Feels right on the edge of being called a "museum" too. Sounds more like an amusement park.

      I guess the question is, is it an awesome museum or crappy amusement park?

      --
      One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    4. Re:Scary indeed! by Moryath · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Lawyers ARE the tyrants these days. We basically live in a lawyerocracy; look how many corrupt lawyers there are in congress, the white house, etc... it's gotten to the point where the few honest lawyers will actually tell you that NOBODY KNOWS how many possible federal crimes there are - you can't go two steps without theoretically breaking the law somehow.

      The phrase "they're always guilty of something"? The lawyers made it so.

    5. Re:Scary indeed! by Moryath · · Score: 2, Interesting

      By who now?

      Count up the number of bad lawsuits you've seen. Count up the number of times you've been in a jury selection pool, only some dickweed shyster had you removed with a peremptory challenge because you are "too smart" and they can't bamboozle you.

      The day we first had jury selection consultants is the day the justice system DIED. It just doesn't know it yet.

  2. Slashdotted? by CannonballHead · · Score: 2, Funny

    It appears to be slashdotted. Service Unavailable. I guess the web administrator is in the jungle gym...

  3. Kids? by siwelwerd · · Score: 3, Informative

    It boasts a five-story jungle gym with two real-life jets kids can climb on, an enclosed Monster Slide that drops riders the length of three staircases, and a rooftop Ferris wheel.

    Kids? Every time I've been there there has been a significant percentage of 20-somethings in addition to the little ones.

    1. Re:Kids? by gman003 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      They're kids on the inside

    2. Re:Kids? by WhiteDragon · · Score: 2, Informative

      Kids? Every time I've been there there has been a significant percentage of 20-somethings in addition to the little ones.

      The museum requires that all children are accompanied by an adult, and groups of kids must have adults in at least a 1:6 adult to child ratio. Also, it sounds like it would be fun for adults as well :-D

      --
      Did you mount a military-grade, variable-focus MASER on an unlicensed artificial intelligence?
    3. Re:Kids? by BarryJacobsen · · Score: 2, Funny

      They're kids on the inside

      Possibly drunk on the inside, as well. :P

      --
      Track your TV Shows with your iPhone - FREE
  4. AWESOME by v1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    SOOO tired of "oh noes Little Timmy is gonna bump his knee on that, need more padding!" parents.

    Quit taking the fun out of being a kid. Having fun as a kid is inherently a little risky. All these nuts trying to apply "five 9's" to public safety on playgrounds need to go live in a bubble somewhere and stay out of everyone else's lives.

    The day they try to take trees out of the park because a kid may climb them and fall and get hurt, I'm gonna flip out.

    --
    I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
    1. Re:AWESOME by multipartmixed · · Score: 2, Insightful

      > The day they try to take trees out of the park because a kid may climb them and fall and get hurt, I'm gonna flip out.

      Have you noticed that playground equipment is virtually nowhere to be found anymore?

      --

      Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
    2. Re:AWESOME by snowraver1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Marry-go-rounds were awesome. I remember this one thing that was a pole that was about 20 feet tall and it had a metal ring about 6' in diameter at the top. Attached to the ring were lengths of chain with a tire at the end. The whole thing would spin. You would get 3 kids on 3 of the tires and them spin it as fast as you could. Then the person doing the spinning would get on the tire, and the inertia from the 3 other people would send you FLYING. My brother ALMOST got flung off of it into a nearby trampoline.

      We also used to have large swings where the top bar would be ~25-30 feet off the ground so you could swing really high. Now you are lucky to find a swing that is taller than 12'.

      --
      Copyright 2010. All rights reserved. This comment may not be copied in any way including, but not limited to caching.
    3. Re:AWESOME by cgenman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I remember people falling out of jungle gyms and breaking their arms as a kid. It's not great, but it happens. There was a woman at my college who fell backwards walking around the campus, hit her head just wrong on the cement, and died. I broken an arm riding a bike, and nearly shattered my hip rollerblading. My sister broke a finger running through the house. A friend destroyed most of the cartilidge in his back playing football. By comparison, hopping a fence, sticking your fingers into a giant rotating drum, and having them severed is just dumb.

      Really, the question isn't "are there injuries?" Put a drinking fountain in a park, and given enough time and people someone is going to trip and break their teeth on it. The question is "how frequently are the injuries?" Are the injuries more frequent than other activities in life? They've had 3.5 million in attendance since 2005, and 24 known incidents that spawned a lawsuit. That's 150k people through for every known injury. Or, looked at another way, assuming each trip is 8 hours long, that's 1 injury for every 50,000 days of living. That's 1 lawsuit-worthy injury per 136 years of life.

      I'd want to investigate this park specifically to see what steps they are and aren't taking to keep the play areas safe. But the numbers above just don't look bad to me.

      --
      The ______ Agenda
  5. To: the guy who only spent an hour in the museum. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've been there twice each time for 3-4 hours. I recommended it to some friends. They spent 45 minutes. The reason why. Because they are boring. They did absolutely no exploring. So didn't even find over half of the place. You have to EXPLORE. You want to know what they do at barbecues and parties. Sit and played x-box with a blank look on their face and grunted occasionally when they noticed you were talking to them. This is in no way aimed at the guy who said he was only there for an hour. Actually wait. Yes it is.

  6. Two dozen out of how many? by iamhassi · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Two dozen injuries out of 3.5 million people since 2005. That means over 99.999% are fine. I'll take those odds. Besides I've been there, nothings wrong, isn't anymore dangerous than any children's playground.

    --
    my karma will be here long after I'm gone
    1. Re:Two dozen out of how many? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      else we'll have a whole generation who never really grow up into proper adults

      Too late.

    2. Re:Two dozen out of how many? by tniermann · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I've been there numerous times with my kids. It seems safer than most places because it appears much more dangerous than it actuality and the kid's natural fear instinct works just fine. It is a much better than the inverse of actually dangerous but appearing safe (driving in the car to get there)

  7. This is how it really should be by cwills · · Score: 5, Insightful
    More power to the Museum and it's director.

    I just wish that the US population would get over the general reaction to anything is to sue someone.

    If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid. Q - "Q Who" Star Trek the Next Generation

    One of my favorite quotes.

    1. Re:This is how it really should be by Nautical+Insanity · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home and crawl under your bed.

      I would, but according to this that might not be a good idea since 300 people strangle themselves in bed every year in the US.

  8. Danger by TheTick21 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have spent way too much time in this wonderland and I must say that with proper adult supervision the danger is minimal compared to the kinds of stuff we did as kids. We used to leave in the morning and come back when the streetlights came on, build treehouses with exposed nails and rotting wood, jump down from said treehouses with nothing but a pile of leaves to catch us.

    This place has its share of dangers, but wow. Worth it and then some. If ever there was a place that took all my favorite childhood memories and tried to stuff them into one building it would be this one.

  9. "We have a huge liability policy." by ryrw · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I met Bob Cassily a few years in St. Louis (where I've lived for 5 years) and I asked him how they deal with lawsuits. He answered: "We have a huge liability policy." Having been there at least half a dozen times, I have to agree that it can be dangerous—if you're stupid. Yes, you can climb over the railing and onto the airplane wing where you might fall 5 stories onto the parking lot. But if you're dumb enough to climb over the railing, then maybe you're doing us all a favor by removing your genes from society. If you've ever seen this place in real life, you'll have to agree that it's just so incredible that it should be kept just as it is. It is absolutely astonishing!

  10. Just use common sense by Grim+Beefer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been to the City Museum several times, and I must say there is really no other place like it on earth. If anyone finds the museum lacking in content, I'd have to say that you're missing the point. The CM is all about interaction; you're not meant to just see everything in the plain sense, you're meant to climb, explore, and seek out the little hidden places tucked away all over the place. Almost everything about the place is entirely free-form, and that's part of the thrill. If you find that the place only satisfies curiosity for about an hour, well then I bet you're probably a pretty boring person that's way too grown up for their own good.

    Meanwhile, it's so refreshing to see a place disregard all of the idiot tags we're so used to seeing everyday. Given that 99.999% of the population doesn't need to be told not to do stupid things, it's really that tiny fraction of people that makes everything always suck. The ones that make you wonder who the fuck would be stupid enough to eat the silicate pellet packs you find in new shoes, but also have the ability to read. The only place remotely similar to the CM where I live is so padded, safe, and banal by comparison. Yes, there is the risk of getting hurt in the CM, but the same thing is often true of places kids play. Even a simple jungle gym can result in a broken bone (as it did with me in the 3rd grade), but the point is to not generate boring people by sacrificing a fun life for complete and utter safety. Learning how to deal with potentially dangerous environments, yet still enjoy yourself, should be a crucial part of any kids upbringing. You have to use common sense to NOT INTENTIONALLY PUT YOUR FINGERS OR BODY IN A GIGANTIC MOVING METAL DEVICE. You shouldn't need a sign explaining why this is a bad idea. Nowhere in the CM will you find spots where good old fashioned common sense will keep you from getting hurt, and at the very least are no more risky that other theme parks/playgrounds.

  11. One of the best places anywhere... by Gybrwe666 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm the parent of 3 youngsters, and we go there all the time. Without a doubt it is one of the most engaging and fun places to take a kid in St. Louis. My kids play to exhaustion every time they go. As a matter of fact, so do I. We always comment (or hear people around us commenting) on how amazing it is that, considering the risk, they have the sort of place where nothing is off limits, and if you can get to it, you can go and climb on it and play on it. Is there danger? Yes, but you can drown in a bucket of water if you try hard enough, and the fun more than outweighs any problems.

    I'm just amazed by how little the WSJ article actually said about the place, seeing as how they only mentioned 1/10 of the things you can do there. And they were incorrect about the big slide. It's actually about 9 stories tall, going from the 10th floor to the 1st. Bah, the state of journalism.

    Anyway, cool place. Visit if you can.

  12. Superb place to visit (with pics) by PGillingwater · · Score: 5, Informative

    I want to add myself to the list of fans of this admirable place....

    Here's a set of photos of the St. Louis Museum I took earlier this year.

    The experience of climbing the spiral staircase, while listening to live music from the massive pipe organ was almost surreal...

    --
    Paul Gillingwater
    MBA, CISSP, CISM
  13. One of the MUST SEE places in STL by jdharm · · Score: 2, Informative

    I lived in STL for 5 great years and took many, many visitors there. Every one of them was taken aback by the price of admission when they got there and every one was exhausted and saying it was totally worth every penny when they left.

    Not only is the place a great playground for kids and adults alike, but some of the examples of architecture and industry that is displayed and incorporated into the Museum is beautiful and amazing to anyone who is into that kind of thing. The terracotta architectural pieces are totally rad.

    One of the coolest 'exhibits' in the CM is "Caves". Nine stories of concrete and steel, molded into caves to explore. Walk along and see a hole in the wall...crawl in and see where it goes. Some spaces were tight enough to scare me, some passages went down and I found myself crawling through a rebar tunnel on a ceiling 20ft above people on the floor. There's a couple spiral slides that drop down through 4 or 5 stories. And the last time I went there was an automatic pipe organ that seemed to fill every spare inch of space in the building pumping out circus music, along with a bank of robotic percussion instruments behind some steel grate.

    If you go to STL for any reason and you are between the ages of 1 and 101, you have to go. You won't be disappointed.

  14. 110 Percent Awesome by gcanyon · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I've been to the City Museum several times, and it is an incredible place. They have an aquarium, a pipe organ, caves, a circus school, a ten-story slide, a bank vault door, and a hall of insects, and that's just scratching the surface. Here is a collection of pictures I took: http://gcanyon.posterous.com/st-louis-is-amazing and a few more: http://gcanyon.posterous.com/more-pictures-from-the-city-museum-in-st-loui

    It's definitely true that this place leans more towards fun than safe: if you don't have bruises, you haven't seen the museum. But common sense will keep you from most harm, a

  15. He's not done yet. by LaminatorX · · Score: 3, Informative

    There's an old industrial site north of downtown that Casilly wants to turn into a water park with the same ethos. It's stuck in permit hell, but I'll continue to hold out hope.

  16. Not for the timid by codepigeon · · Score: 2, Informative

    I have been to the CM a couple times. It is definately a lot of fun. One word of caution though, there are some places there (that i found while trying to keep up with my son) that can trigger claustrophobia.
    I have to agree with others that it is a must see.

    1. Re:Not for the timid by bar-agent · · Score: 2, Funny

      One word of caution though, there are some places there (that i found while trying to keep up with my son) that can trigger claustrophobia.

      That is a good educational experience right there. Most people don't normally get to see what claustrophobia is like until they go crawling around in caves.

      --
      i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
  17. One of my favorite places by RebrandSoftware · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I took my one year old daughter here on her first airplane trip and we had an absolute blast. I would rank this place as one of the coolest places I have ever been, and the absolute coolest museum ever. I did not encounter anything "dangerous" there that couldn't also be found on a standard playground. I'm looking forward to taking her back when she's 4 or 5 and can really enjoy it. I wish there were more places like the city museum.