Louisville Kentucky: Frazier Museum Exhibit Explores Natural History, Science, Folklore Behind Mythic Creatures

Credit Erin Keane / WFPL News
A Kraken model frames the sea monster exhibit, which includes a replica of P.T. Barnum's "Feejee Mermaid" and other natural history and anthropology sources behind sea monster myths

ERIN KEANE
WFLP News 89.3 FM

There’s no scientific proof that the elusive Bigfoot exists. The fearsome Chupacabra (a cryptid known in Puerto Rico and Mexico as a small livestock vampire of sorts) doesn't belong to an identifiable genus or species. And yet, tales of unclassified creatures have endured across cultures and throughout history.

Credit Erin Keane / WFPL News
A re-creation of an extinct giant ape that lived
300,000 years ago resembles the mythic creature known as Bigfoot.

Curated by the American Museum of Natural History in New York, the 7,500-square-foot Mythic Creatures exhibit at the Frazier History Museum explores the natural histories of creatures like dragons and giants. It sounds cheeky. How do you create an historical exhibit out of cryptozoology—the study of creatures that likely never existed? But the exhibit is really a cleverly-disguised package of anthropology, geography, paleontology, international history, biology, literature and archeology. The flashy Pegasus model is the bait, and the ancient Greek coins (Corinth, 650-510 B.C.) depicting the winged horse are the historical pay-off. The exhibit includes historical artifacts and fossils, as well as literary and historical accounts that help us understand how and why myths begin and persist.

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