Many museums, libraries, and other cultural organizations offer free admission on certain days of the month. In Los Angeles, for example, visitors to LACMA get in free on the second Tuesday of the month. Confusingly enough, next door at the Page Museum (AKA La Brea “tar” pits), free admission is on the first Tuesday of the month. Makes sense from a “keep-em-coming-back” standpoint, I guess, although it’s not particularly user-friendly, since parking on those free days is not free at all.
Here in South Florida, free admission is a bit harder to come by; neither the Museum of Art nor the Museum of Discovery and Science admit to having free admission on their website, although they could keep the secret under wraps, for all I know. The South Florida Science Museum up in West Palm Beach used to run a series of Free Fridays: Every Friday in September and October, admission was free to all comers. The amateur astronomers of the ASPB would bring their scopes out onto the back lawn and give everyone tours of the heavens. It was really a lot of fun. I hope they hold it again this year.
But there is a place where admission is always free: the library! My office is across the street from the main branch of the Broward Library, so I’m over there frequently to browse the collection, and to read up on birds, dinosaurs, and whatnot. And what’s more, the Friends of the Library run an event called First Friday,* where they have a book fair and special displays. This month’s event even features a lunchtime concert, too, so it’s some serious bang for your buck!
In case you’re wondering why I’m talking about First Fridays on the second Thursday of the month, see what greeted me last week as I hustled across the street on my lunch hour to attend:
They’ve rescheduled the event for tomorrow due to a flood in the building last week. I hope to have better luck on Second Friday…
*Sadly for those concerned with literacy, the Friends website refers to this event in the plural, but they add an apostrophe, making it First Friday’s. Hate to always be picking nits, but if we’re fostering literacy, we might at least do it literately…
[UPDATE: The book fair was on, but, surprise, surprise, it turns out I didn’t want any of the books that the library didn’t want either…]
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