Stories from the stores

On Saturday I visited the Kingsway tram tunnel in central London. This wonderful piece of Edwardian transport infrastructure opened in 1906 to allow electric trams to traverse central London without being held up by the horse-drawn congestion above ground:

Kingsway tram tunnel (David Rooney)

It was initially built for single-deck trams (compare my pic with this period photo from the London Transport Museum), but the tunnel was enlarged in the 1930s to accommodate double-deck vehicles similar to this one in our reserve collection, originally from Glasgow:

Glasgow double-deck tram (Science Museum / Science & Society)

However, by the second world war trams were falling out of favour and were rapidly being replaced by electric trolley buses and diesel buses. By 1952 the tunnel was no longer fit for purpose and was closed (a portion was converted in the ’60s to act as a vehicle underpass).

Since then it’s been fenced off and used for storage, and is rarely open to the public (but see this visit report, and this one), but for a few weeks, the Science Museum’s artist-in-residence, Conrad Shawcross, is using the tunnel as the site for his latest artwork, ‘Chord’ (read about it here). Chord features a complex rope-spinning machine crawling along a timber track within the tunnel – the perfect slow antidote to the frenzy of traffic above.

It’s a beautifully-made and engaging sculpture and well worth a visit if you can get a ticket. And if transport is your thing, you might also be interested in seeing behind the scenes at the Science Museum’s store in west London, Blythe House… if you join our membership scheme you get invited to special member events, including my tour of one of the transport rooms on 12 November…

Model vehicles in the Science Museum collection (David Rooney)

The National Railway Museum has a very odd-looking device buried in its collections: a working model of a gyrostatic monorail car invented by Louis Brennan in 1907.

I don’t feel able or qualified to explain the physics of gyrostats here. Suffice to say, Brennan’s vehicle ran on a single rail, stabilized by ingeniously-designed spinning fly-wheels so that it stayed upright even when fully loaded.

Brennan gyroscopic monorail car (National Railway Museum)

Ingenious inventions like the gyrocar were all the rage in Edwardian Britain. On my shelves at home is a copy of ‘Twentieth Century Inventions’, written by Charles Gibson in 1913. Gibson reports on the public demonstrations of Brennan’s full-sized car, pictured above:

“While it looked strange to see a heavy car running round a circular track on a single rail, and negotiating the curves as comfortably as a cyclist would, it was more surprising to see the loaded car stop and yet remain upright, even when its forty passengers all crowded to one side of the car.”

But human nature was the problem, not the technology itself. ”One can imagine a very cheap form of suspension bridge if the gyro-car were to come into practical use, but despite the inventor’s actual demonstration with a passenger, it might be difficult to persuade the public to cross a river or a deep ravine with a suspended rope as the sole track.” Here’s the demo. The passenger is Brennan’s daughter:

Brennan gyroscopic car prototype (National Railway Museum)

I must say it looks a pretty cool way to travel! If you want to see this very model, head for the Warehouse in the National Railway Museum this half-term. Every day between now and Sunday, they’re showing it off with an accompanying talk at noon and 2pm. I don’t think they’ll be calling out for brave volunteers to give it a go, but you never know…

I’m just back from a conference in Dresden. The Deutsches Hygiene-Museum, home to the wonderful transparent man (and woman), hosted a conference looking at wax moulages.

Moulages are based on casts taken directly from patients, which are then moulded in wax to present case studies of particular diseases, especially dermatological conditions. Each one has its own medical and cultural story to tell, at once a medical specimen, an individual’s history as a patient, and cultural artefact.

These examples are from our collection, and were part of a touring anatomical show in the 1920s.  These ‘before and after’ waxes show the effects of Salvarsan, the ‘magic bullet’ which was the first effective treatment for syphilis.

One of the great things about the conference was the sense that all kinds of people are getting interested in moulages again. The Charité Museum in Berlin is working on a project documenting moulage collections, while the Hôpital St Louis has its collections online. But also at the conference were people reviving the craft skills and not only preserving but making new moulages. Dermatologists use them to teach students about once common diseases which are now rare and you can even buy bleeding moulages for casualty simulations. Or perhaps Hallowe’en…

It’s great to see the value of items that for while looks like they might be considered as historical ‘curiosities’ being recognised again.

In a previous post, I shared with you my recent visit to the merchant seafarers war memorial in London. I’d gone to find the plaque commemorating the Atlantic Conveyor, a Cunard container ship requisitioned by the Ministry of Defence during the 1982 Falklands war for transport duty, and sunk following an Argentine missile attack.

Soon after the war, Cunard commissioned the original builders of the Atlantic Conveyor, Swan Hunter, to construct her replacement. Taking the same name, the second ship was being fitted out at the Tyne shipyard in 1984 when curators at the Science Museum wanted to commisison a model representing the latest container ship technology.

Cunard sent us full details of Atlantic Conveyor. We had the model built, and she’s now part of the reserve collection stored at Wroughton.

Model of 'Atlantic Conveyor' container ship (Science Museum)

The point here, I guess, is that we didn’t just build a model. We captured a bit of history, we collected a memory. Like the war memorial I visited, our model is something tangible to help us remember the past – and to think about our future.

Objects contain all sorts of stories. This is why we keep so much stuff. When we acquired it, we were interested in the technology of container shipping. Now, I know more about life – and death – at sea in the modern merchant navy. It’s the same object, but I see it differently now. They’re powerful things, things.

As for the second Atlantic Conveyor, well, she’s still hard at work. As I write this post, she’s just left Liverpool and is motoring around the south coast of Ireland heading for Halifax, Canada, according to her automatic tracking system. Still shifting boxes around the oceans, quarter of a century on…

Gaetan Lee is organising tomorrow’s launch event for Cosmic Collections, our website competition. Find out a little more about what to expect.

Gaetan Lee

What should people expect at the event tomorrow?

Well they should expect to get a chance to meet some great people and really get a chance to contribute – to a certain extent its going to be a user-generated event. By coming along they will be able to hear the story of eighteenth century astronomer Caroline Herschel from one of our drama characters and delve into the secrets of the Cosmos & Culture gallery from Ali Boyle, our curator of Astronomy. Dr Chris Welsh from Kingston University will be on hand as well to give people a real insight into how we’re studying the stars today. More importantly though this is a bit of an experiment for the Science Museum, because although we have some great sessions from these experts, we also want the people coming along to add to it as well, sharing their own experience, ideas and talents.

Is there anything you’re particularly looking forward to?

We’re going to be running a special wall activity whereby people can create their own narratives and links between museum objects in much the same way as the curators do when they start to plan an exhibition. We’re really interested to see what the attendees do and how they choose to link their own stories and objects together.

What kind of people will be there?

We’re hoping for a real mix of people, from people with a background in web development, in astronomy or just a general interest in science and technology. Once we get all these people together we’re planning to mix them up and get them working in teams, so it will be a mash-up of people as well as ideas.

Do you think it will give competition entrants an advantage?

By coming along tomorrow people will get a real chance to find other people to work with and but more importantly to get the inside scoop behind our amazing collection of objects. Plus it should be fun!

If you have any questions for Gaetan please leave them as comments below. You can also check out interviews with Mia Ridge, our Web Developer and Ali Boyle, our Curator of Astronomy.

The other day I had a look round Trinity Square Gardens, a little park in front of the headquarters of Trinity House. Surrounded by the bustle of tourists visiting the nearby Tower of London, the garden is by contrast a very sombre space.

It contains the Tower Hill Memorial to sailors in Britain’s merchant navy who have lost their lives at war. Burnished bronze plaques extend along the walls of the memorial containing the names of the dead.

Tower Hill Memorial (David Rooney)

The World War Two section contains the moving inscription, “The twenty four thousand of the merchant navy and fishing fleets whose names are honoured on the walls of this garden gave their lives for their country and have no grave but the sea.”

Tower Hill Memorial (David Rooney)

This memorial brings home the individual stories as well as the stark statistical horror. Scattered across the neat lawn, almost like fallen autumn leaves, are individual marks of remembrance.

Tower Hill Memorial - detail (David Rooney)

Standing to one side is a more modest plinth remembering merchant seafarers killed in the Falklands conflict. The loss of the Sir Galahad is fairly well-known, but there’s also a plaque here to the Atlantic Conveyor, a container ship built by Swan Hunter on the river Tyne in 1970.

Atlantic Conveyor memorial (David Rooney)

In 1982 she was requisitioned by the Ministry of Defence for transport duties in the Falklands, and on 25 May, she was hit by two Argentinian Exocet missiles. Twelve men were killed, nine from the merchant navy.

My visit was prompted by research into one of our ship models. I’m out of space today, so I’ll tell you more in a later post…

I mentioned before how much I love Blythe House, our storehouse in west London. This is where we keep the things that aren’t on display in the Science Museum or out at Wroughton. There’s some great stuff tucked away. For instance, these model buoys have always caught me eye - a set designed to teach people what the different colours and shapes mean. Philip Treacy, eat your heart out:

Model buoys in Science Museum collection (David Rooney)

 Nearby are these motor car spark plugs. Pink – and pretty as a picture:

Spark plugs (David Rooney)

You like spark plugs? We have lots of spark plugs:

Spark plugs (David Rooney)

Finally, as I wandered round the room, these handsome little fellows peered out from another shelf (where they live, in perpetual readiness to travel, next to a display unit of, yes, spark plugs). Very dapper:

Model of Stagg road-rail steam carriage (David Rooney)

Here’s the thing. If you are the sort of person who likes stuff like model buoys, pink spark plugs and well-dressed diminutive Victorian gentlemen, you’ll probably love visiting Blythe House. Normally it’s closed to the public, but we have a membership scheme (as most museums do) and members get invited to occasional Blythe House tours.

It’s my turn on Thursday 12 November at 6.30pm, and you’ve still time to join the scheme if you fancy coming along. You’d be supporting our work (thank you) and there are lots of benefits besides the tours. You can join online here. And if you’re very good, I might even show you my carburettors…

This Saturday (24 October), we’re launching our Cosmic Collections website ‘mash-up’ competition. Just in case anyone else is as baffled as me, I asked our Lead Web Developer, Mia Ridge, a few questions about the competition.

For the non-geeks out there, what’s a mash-up?

A mashup is a website or application that combines separate data sources and/or visualisation tools into a single integrated interface.

A really useful example is moveflat – you can search for housing by bus route or on a map of London.  The site mashes up data provided in housing ads with StreetMap and GoogleMaps so that the interface just works for the site visitor.

Why did you decide to run a mash-up competition for Cosmos & Culture?The idea of a mashup just seemed a perfect match for this exhibition.

Over the past few years there’s been a lot of discussion in cultural heritage technology forums about the need for APIs (instructions and methods for computers to request content and functions from each other) in museums. Some museums have released APIs, but it’s been difficult to find out how much real demand there is from non-museum programmers – I thought this would be one way to find out.

A comparatively small budget for web work in the original project meant we risked producing a bland museum microsite that might not do the objects and their stories justice.  There are so many ways of looking at these objects – as pieces of industrial design, as examples of the way we tell stories about the night sky, as artefacts from the history of science and technology, as personal items belonging to explorers and innovators, as beautiful objects in their own right… opening up the data to let people create their own sites seemed like a good way to enable other people to show us the collections as they see them.

A page from Nicolaus Copernicus’s De revolutionibus celestium orbium

I knew there was an active online astronomy community, and that sites like Galaxy Zoo had ‘crowdsourced’ the classifications of galaxies, leading to some new discoveries.  One of the key messages of the exhibition was that amateur astronomers can still make important contributions, and that seemed to be a good match with the idea of encouraging people use our data in their own research.

Converting some of our web budget into prize money seemed like a concrete way of recognising the contributions and work of people working with our content.

How ground-breaking is it for a museum?

As far as I know, we’re the first museum to run a competition to crowd-source the creation of an exhibition site like this.

A few museums have produced APIs or published other ways to programmatically access their data and there have been lots of mashup competitions and hack days in the private and public sector but the combination is new. I’m very lucky – when I approached the curator with my idea, she could have thought I was being just a bit too experimental, but she decided to give it a go.

Good question!  I have absolutely no idea – which is both exciting and scary. Typically, mashups might use timelines or maps, but there’s some amazing visualisation work going on and tools like IBM’s Many Eyes make them really easy.

I’m hoping that the final submission date won’t be the end of it – we’d like to help build a community of developers who are interested in working with museum content. I’ll also be using the competition to work out how we can improve our collections API, and as input to on-going experiments with our online collections. I’m taking the approach of small experiments and iterative development that I can fit in around bigger project deadlines, partly because it’s a good match for the available resources and partly to test the benefits of a more agile approach.

If you have more questions for Mia please post them as comments below. To find out more about the exhibition and the objects on display check out our earlier interview with Ali Boyle, Curator of Astronomy.

Ali Boyle is the Curator of Astronomy at the Science Museum. She oversaw Cosmos & Culture, one of our newest exhibitions so I asked her a few questions about putting the exhibition together and the Cosmic Collections website competition that we’re just about to launch…

What’s the Cosmos & Culture exhibition about, and how did you select and organise the objects?

Cosmos & Culture looks at how people all around the world have interacted with the skies throughout history. It uses the Science Museum’s unique collections, and the stories of the people behind the objects, which makes it a very particular portrayal of astronomy that you won’t find elsewhere.

Armillary Globe

The objects are organised around three major themes: the tools we’ve made to explore the cosmos, the ideas we have come up with to make sense of what we’ve seen, and how we’ve used astronomy in our daily lives. We tried several different ways of organising the exhibition content and settled on this as the best way to cover such a large subject area and historical span. But we could have organised things completely differently, and the web competition is a great way to explore what other themes might make for good storytelling.

Selecting objects for exhibitions is always a challenge, as we have far more objects in our collection than we could ever display in a gallery. Some objects are obvious choices – for example, we really wanted to display Thomas Harriot’s drawings to mark the 400th anniversary of his first lunar observations with a telescope.

Thomas Harriot’s Moon map. Lord Egremont / West Sussex Record Office

Some we choose because we know lots about them, which helps to tell stories. Some are beautiful and included for dramatic visual appeal on gallery, and there are always a few that the curators just have a personal affection for!

Read the rest of this entry »

Even though I’ve worked at the Science Museum for eight years, I still find the Flight Gallery stunning. It reminds me of my childhood bedroom ceiling, with one big difference: I had plastic kits hanging in dogfight freeze frames, the Flight Gallery has the real things! 

One thing that really sticks out is this crab incrusted trophy with the plump-bottom angel (supposed to represent the Spirit of Flight kissing the waves).

Schneider trophy

It’s the Schneider Trophy, which was offered from 1913 to encourage the development of seaplanes. 

The history of the trophy is packed with colourful stories. In 1919, Italy was the only team to get their plane up and around the course but they didn’t win, because due to the fog the panel couldn’t be sure that they’d completed the course.

Then in 1929 a broken piston head was found during a last-minute check on the British plane. They rallied up Rolls Royce engineers in the area but rumour has it that at that late hour the only available engineers were found in the local pub…

It flew the next day and won.

The British Government was slow to support the entries, but some colourful individuals came forward with the money. In 1922, Fanny Huston, an East End musical hall singer who had had a string of extremely wealthy husbands was a major investor.

The Supermarine S6B seaplane won this trophy for Great Britain in 1931, and is also in the Flight Gallery. It reached a top speed of 340mph and as it was the third consequtive win for the Brits we got to keep the trophy, bringing this bit of history to an end.

Supermarine Rolls-Royce S6B seaplane, 1931

Incredibly, the first race for the Schneider trophy was held only ten years after the first ever flight. The top speed then was 45.75mph and within just 19 years that had increased to 340mph.