Also in Fairmount Park -- which I once learned is the largest park in the US, or maybe the world, within a city limits -- is Robin Hood Dell, where the Philadelphia Orchestra used to (maybe still does?) have a summer concert series. Just to make this a musical thread.

And the Philadelphia Zoological Gardens, the oldest Zoo in the US. There is a children's zoo there on a "replica" of Noah's Ark. What I'm still trying to figure out is how Noah's Ark has managed to shrink so alarmingly since the early 1960s....

Alexander Graham Bell gave the first public demonstration of the telephone at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.

The part of Fairmount Park which is most familiar to non-Philadelphians is the aforementioned Benjamin Franklin Parkway, at the end of which is the Art Museum, whose steps were ascended by Rocky in the (first) film of that name. The same Art Museum (along with the wonderful old Greek-temple-style Waterworks below it on the Schuylkill) can also be seen in Marshall McLuhan's 60's classic, "The Medium is the Massage"!

Hey, M.Ted, maybe we should start a Philly tour guide service! Getcher soft pretzels right here!

Aloha,
Mark