The family of Jim Henson is donating many of his original Muppets to a museum in Atlanta, according to The New York Times.
The Center for Puppetry Arts is the lucky organization. Henson and his creation Kermit the Frog cut the ribbon when the center opened in 1978. Now Kermit, Miss Piggy, and more than 500 other “retired” puppets are making their way there. The Times quotes Henson’s daughter Cheryl as saying, “We are assuming we are going to give them the best of our collection.”
Henson, incidentally, would have turned 71 this September. He was only 53 when he died in 1990 after an infection turned into toxic shock and pneumonia. Here’s a touching memoir of Henson’s funeral that year at New York’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine.