Kid City Set Piece

The performance installations and playscapes at the Kid City children’s museum in Middletown have always been impressive. The newest is a “Celebrated Bathing Fluid Dispensary” credited to the inventor Pulaski Nostrum (1854-1906). Through lit signs, machine helps participants soap, rub, rinse and dry their hands—all to the rhythm of a mechanical bicyclist.
Kid City claims this is a genuine relic from an earlier era of handwashing, bequeathed to the play place by Nostrum’s great-niece Berniece. According to her wishes, a posted document by the museum’s director states, the Bathing Fluid Dispensary is “installed in a replica of the red-and-green paneled cloakroom of her Great Uncle’s beloved club, the Archeological Society of Washingtown.”
Such sudsy subtlety is not lost on children. A magical bit of scenic design.