Super Exhibit at the Cleveland Public Library!
It's a bird, it's a plane, no.....it's the Cleveland Public Library!
That is what I posted on Facebook when visiting the Superman Exhibit at the Cleveland Public Library. I had time to kill before heading over to Progressive Field for an Indians game and decided to see the highly anticipated exhibit. Complaints have been voice over the years that not much is in Cleveland to commemorate that Superman was created in this city. This exhibit changes that.
I walked in the front doors and walked up a small flight of steps on the first floor to see one of the main rooms of the exhibit. I inquired to the gentleman standing in front of the doors if there was a fee and he replied there wasn't. Everything I was about to see was all free.
Upon walking into the main atrium on the first floor, I was amazed at the layout. The first artifact that caught my eye was Brandon Routh's costume from Bryan Singer's Superman Returns film that was released in 2006. The overall costume didn't look very big on the dummy but being a fan of the movie, it was impressive to see that right away. Multiple people kept asking the security guard (including me) to take a picture next to it.
Speaking of that security guard, after he took my picture next to the costume, he mentioned something in the exhibit you no longer see on the streets; a phone booth! Even though they are nonexistent now due to the age of smart phones, a phone booth has played a vital role in Superman stories. My earliest memories of Superman involve him using a phone booth to change from Clark Kent to Superman. I immediately walked over to where it was and the security guard took my picture in it.
Not too long after the picture was taken, another gentleman with his young daughter approached the phone booth. She was about five years old and kept giving strange looks to the phone booth. Her father had to explain what it was and the significance of it to Superman. She seemed to grasp what the phone booth was for after her father described how it was used. A piece of history was able to connect to a younger generation in that moment.
The first floor mainly discusses the influences behind Superman and the creation of the character. There is verbiage on how creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster drew inspiration from Olympic swimmer and Tarzan actor Johnny Weismuller, who broke a world record at the Cleveland Athletic Club close to the time the character was created, and Olympic sprinter Jesse Owens. There is also memorabilia from The Adventures of Superman starring the late George Reeves and a section on all the actors who have played Superman in movies and television (the only flaw I found with this part was that it left out Tyler Hoechlin, who recently has played Superman on The CW's Supergirl).
The second and third floors have various pieces of memorabilia on Superman and discuss the influences the character has had on other comics. There is even a section on how the writers have had to discuss Superman's difficulty of relating to human life due to the fact he is an alien. Seeing some of the handwritten drawings from the comics up close was a great sight to see and everyone I saw walking through was in awe of the whole exhibit.
The exhibit can easily be completed in 30-40 minutes but is worth the trip to downtown Cleveland to see. It truly is a great tribute to an incredible character created in a fun city.
That is what I posted on Facebook when visiting the Superman Exhibit at the Cleveland Public Library. I had time to kill before heading over to Progressive Field for an Indians game and decided to see the highly anticipated exhibit. Complaints have been voice over the years that not much is in Cleveland to commemorate that Superman was created in this city. This exhibit changes that.
I walked in the front doors and walked up a small flight of steps on the first floor to see one of the main rooms of the exhibit. I inquired to the gentleman standing in front of the doors if there was a fee and he replied there wasn't. Everything I was about to see was all free.
Upon walking into the main atrium on the first floor, I was amazed at the layout. The first artifact that caught my eye was Brandon Routh's costume from Bryan Singer's Superman Returns film that was released in 2006. The overall costume didn't look very big on the dummy but being a fan of the movie, it was impressive to see that right away. Multiple people kept asking the security guard (including me) to take a picture next to it.
Speaking of that security guard, after he took my picture next to the costume, he mentioned something in the exhibit you no longer see on the streets; a phone booth! Even though they are nonexistent now due to the age of smart phones, a phone booth has played a vital role in Superman stories. My earliest memories of Superman involve him using a phone booth to change from Clark Kent to Superman. I immediately walked over to where it was and the security guard took my picture in it.
Not too long after the picture was taken, another gentleman with his young daughter approached the phone booth. She was about five years old and kept giving strange looks to the phone booth. Her father had to explain what it was and the significance of it to Superman. She seemed to grasp what the phone booth was for after her father described how it was used. A piece of history was able to connect to a younger generation in that moment.
The first floor mainly discusses the influences behind Superman and the creation of the character. There is verbiage on how creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster drew inspiration from Olympic swimmer and Tarzan actor Johnny Weismuller, who broke a world record at the Cleveland Athletic Club close to the time the character was created, and Olympic sprinter Jesse Owens. There is also memorabilia from The Adventures of Superman starring the late George Reeves and a section on all the actors who have played Superman in movies and television (the only flaw I found with this part was that it left out Tyler Hoechlin, who recently has played Superman on The CW's Supergirl).
The second and third floors have various pieces of memorabilia on Superman and discuss the influences the character has had on other comics. There is even a section on how the writers have had to discuss Superman's difficulty of relating to human life due to the fact he is an alien. Seeing some of the handwritten drawings from the comics up close was a great sight to see and everyone I saw walking through was in awe of the whole exhibit.
The exhibit can easily be completed in 30-40 minutes but is worth the trip to downtown Cleveland to see. It truly is a great tribute to an incredible character created in a fun city.
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