Here are some photographs of some of the hidden treasures of London's Natural History Museum, one of the world's great museums and Britain's most popular cultural tourist attraction....
Natural History Museum: natural wonder
19/07/2008
The Telegraph
Few people get to glimpse the treasures hidden behind the scenes at the Natural History Museum, but the photographer Gautier Deblonde was granted rare access to its secret corridors and store rooms. The palaeontologist Richard Fortey, who spent more than three decades working at the museum, takes us on a guided tour
Most great museums have treasures hidden away behind the public galleries, but the Natural History Museum must belong in a class of its own. Beyond the familiar dinosaur displays lies a secret warren of galleries and store rooms, stuffed with millions of specimens.
I spent more than three decades working in the museum, so was able to explore its odd corners, hidden rooms and twisting staircases more than most. I was still discovering secret redoubts occupied by curators until my last day.
Mammals outgrew the South Kensington site and were moved to a new store in Wandsworth
When I took the writer Bill Bryson behind the scenes recently, we went in a small and ancient lift to an upper floor only to have the automatic gate open on to a solid brick wall. He took pleasure in my astonished response: 'That's odd, the last time I came here there was a door.'
When you do find a door that opens you are likely to come face to face with an aardvark or a zebu, or anything in between. The collections in South Kensington grow all the time, as more specimens are added from around the world. They are a global archive for all the species of animals and plants on the planet, a reference collection for scientists and naturalists everywhere.
Specimens include stuffed sea lions, deer, monkeys and gorillas
People like me, who are privileged to work behind the scenes, can wander through the whole of nature, from microbe to mammoth. It is all there in cupboards, catalogued and arranged according to the latest classification. Or we can handle some of the great masterpieces of natural history, like the first edition of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. Only the rooms containing gold and diamonds require a special pass.
Organisms that cannot be stored as dried examples are pickled in spirit in the Darwin Centre, adjacent to the main Waterhouse building. The fish alone would make Damien Hirst green with envy: sharks, sunfish, sprats, sad-looking monsters from the deep sea with eyes like saucers and covered in warts. There is floor after floor of jars and tanks with faces of lizards or lumpfish staring at you.
The zoology area of the Natural History Museum's warehouse
Mammals have outgrown the South Kensington site and have been carried off to a new store in Wandsworth. This is a big-game hunter's fantasy come alive; endless ranks of antlers and wildebeest, of meerkats and mandrills. In Imperial times, a knowledgeable crack-shot might readily have been recruited to the ranks of zoologists. Specimens lined up on parade like so many trophies were indeed bagged by sahibs or bwanas on safari. The gifts of Empire are still preserved, and rightly, because game will never be as prolific again, and is it not better to preserve an archive of a richness that has vanished in the wild?
Then there are exhibits that have themselves become extinct, now hidden away. In 1902 people flocked to London to see the stuffed okapi, which had only recently been recognised by science. The archives have many such exhibits, outflanked by time and fashion. There is something rather poignant about a stuffed gorilla in a glass case. We are so accustomed to seeing them full of vigour in wildlife films.
The warehouse currently houses more than 12,000 specimens covering 1,200 species, including seals, deer and kangaroos
The oldest exhibit on display in the galleries is a mounted series of jewel-like hummingbirds, which still attracts cries of admiration in the era of interactive exhibits. The time of the stuffed gorilla may yet come again.
The model of the blue whale was completed in 1938 and has been on permanent display since (it was buffed up again in 2007). The sheer bulk of the world's largest creature continues to astonish. Naturally, it is hollow inside. During the Second World War it is supposed to have housed an illicit still. The museum formerly received stranded whales in a great shed at the back of the building.
Guy the gorilla is from London Zoo
It was here that the museum's whale man, Peter Purves, pioneered methods for ageing the mammals by counting waxy growth rings inside their inner ears. Purves was an inveterate drinker, and much less adept at his work when sober. The smell of a ripe whale is noxious and it could be argued that alcohol was necessary to help him survive in the whale room. (It was said that he kept half-bottles of Bushmills tucked away in the blubber.)
For all that the museum was once a conservative, hierarchical place, staff were free to be naughty. The bird gallery is the last of the old-style galleries: crammed with stuffed specimens, left behind to show how things used to be done. It contains a fine dodo, decked out in whitish feathers. It is a bogus bird from the 1950s, since no perfect specimens survive, and is largely based on a painting. It was decided that swan feathers were just what was needed to make the model look convincing.
Rows of deer skeletons
The trouble is, Thames swans belong to the Queen and should not be harmed. This didn't deter Barney Newman, another of the museum's distinguished topers who, with an accomplice, grabbed a large cygnet from under Hammersmith bridge when nobody was looking, and stuffed it into a bag.
Museums rarely throw things away. Formerly, there was a 6ft-long model of the large plant- eating dinosaur diplodocus on display in the Main Hall. This was in the days when diplodocus was portrayed with a drooping tail, somewhat like a giant lizard, rather than with the perky, whiplash tail of modern versions. It became outmoded and was taken off the gallery. I discovered the model again recently, lying on top of a cupboard in a remote part of the collection, like a forgotten toy.
All the collections have to be constantly maintained. The specimens preserved in spirit must be 'topped up'. If unchecked, specialised insects will make a hearty meal of skins and feathers. The original British Museum, founded by Sir Hans Sloane in 1753, included mammal specimens, nearly all of which had been consumed by carpet beetle and moths by the beginning of the 19th century. But his dry plants survive today in a special herbarium. If they are kept carefully, pressed plants are as enduring as oil paintings.
An elephant seal skeleton and a stuffed black-maned lion of the Cape, a subspecies of lion that is now extinct in the wild
The hidden priesthood of the museum is becoming less of a closed order. It is already possible to take a tour into the Darwin Centre to see the great collections of animals preserved in spirit.
The green agenda means that the cataloguers of the natural world are recognised as being on the side of the angels. The collections of the Natural History Museum may yet prove to be the conscience for the world. What is preserved carefully in the collections in the vaults may have been foolishly extinguished by our own greedy species in the great outdoors.
Richard Fortey is the author of 'Dry Store Room No. 1: The Secret Life of the Natural History Museum' (£20, HarperPress). Order a copy for £18 plus £1.25 p&p from Telegraph Books (0870-428 4112; books.telegraph.co.uk). Natural History Museum: 020-7942 5000; nhm.ac.uk
telegraph.co.uk
Natural History Museum: natural wonder
19/07/2008
The Telegraph
Few people get to glimpse the treasures hidden behind the scenes at the Natural History Museum, but the photographer Gautier Deblonde was granted rare access to its secret corridors and store rooms. The palaeontologist Richard Fortey, who spent more than three decades working at the museum, takes us on a guided tour
Most great museums have treasures hidden away behind the public galleries, but the Natural History Museum must belong in a class of its own. Beyond the familiar dinosaur displays lies a secret warren of galleries and store rooms, stuffed with millions of specimens.
I spent more than three decades working in the museum, so was able to explore its odd corners, hidden rooms and twisting staircases more than most. I was still discovering secret redoubts occupied by curators until my last day.
Mammals outgrew the South Kensington site and were moved to a new store in Wandsworth
When I took the writer Bill Bryson behind the scenes recently, we went in a small and ancient lift to an upper floor only to have the automatic gate open on to a solid brick wall. He took pleasure in my astonished response: 'That's odd, the last time I came here there was a door.'
When you do find a door that opens you are likely to come face to face with an aardvark or a zebu, or anything in between. The collections in South Kensington grow all the time, as more specimens are added from around the world. They are a global archive for all the species of animals and plants on the planet, a reference collection for scientists and naturalists everywhere.
Specimens include stuffed sea lions, deer, monkeys and gorillas
People like me, who are privileged to work behind the scenes, can wander through the whole of nature, from microbe to mammoth. It is all there in cupboards, catalogued and arranged according to the latest classification. Or we can handle some of the great masterpieces of natural history, like the first edition of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. Only the rooms containing gold and diamonds require a special pass.
Organisms that cannot be stored as dried examples are pickled in spirit in the Darwin Centre, adjacent to the main Waterhouse building. The fish alone would make Damien Hirst green with envy: sharks, sunfish, sprats, sad-looking monsters from the deep sea with eyes like saucers and covered in warts. There is floor after floor of jars and tanks with faces of lizards or lumpfish staring at you.
The zoology area of the Natural History Museum's warehouse
Mammals have outgrown the South Kensington site and have been carried off to a new store in Wandsworth. This is a big-game hunter's fantasy come alive; endless ranks of antlers and wildebeest, of meerkats and mandrills. In Imperial times, a knowledgeable crack-shot might readily have been recruited to the ranks of zoologists. Specimens lined up on parade like so many trophies were indeed bagged by sahibs or bwanas on safari. The gifts of Empire are still preserved, and rightly, because game will never be as prolific again, and is it not better to preserve an archive of a richness that has vanished in the wild?
Then there are exhibits that have themselves become extinct, now hidden away. In 1902 people flocked to London to see the stuffed okapi, which had only recently been recognised by science. The archives have many such exhibits, outflanked by time and fashion. There is something rather poignant about a stuffed gorilla in a glass case. We are so accustomed to seeing them full of vigour in wildlife films.
The warehouse currently houses more than 12,000 specimens covering 1,200 species, including seals, deer and kangaroos
The oldest exhibit on display in the galleries is a mounted series of jewel-like hummingbirds, which still attracts cries of admiration in the era of interactive exhibits. The time of the stuffed gorilla may yet come again.
The model of the blue whale was completed in 1938 and has been on permanent display since (it was buffed up again in 2007). The sheer bulk of the world's largest creature continues to astonish. Naturally, it is hollow inside. During the Second World War it is supposed to have housed an illicit still. The museum formerly received stranded whales in a great shed at the back of the building.
Guy the gorilla is from London Zoo
It was here that the museum's whale man, Peter Purves, pioneered methods for ageing the mammals by counting waxy growth rings inside their inner ears. Purves was an inveterate drinker, and much less adept at his work when sober. The smell of a ripe whale is noxious and it could be argued that alcohol was necessary to help him survive in the whale room. (It was said that he kept half-bottles of Bushmills tucked away in the blubber.)
For all that the museum was once a conservative, hierarchical place, staff were free to be naughty. The bird gallery is the last of the old-style galleries: crammed with stuffed specimens, left behind to show how things used to be done. It contains a fine dodo, decked out in whitish feathers. It is a bogus bird from the 1950s, since no perfect specimens survive, and is largely based on a painting. It was decided that swan feathers were just what was needed to make the model look convincing.
Rows of deer skeletons
The trouble is, Thames swans belong to the Queen and should not be harmed. This didn't deter Barney Newman, another of the museum's distinguished topers who, with an accomplice, grabbed a large cygnet from under Hammersmith bridge when nobody was looking, and stuffed it into a bag.
Museums rarely throw things away. Formerly, there was a 6ft-long model of the large plant- eating dinosaur diplodocus on display in the Main Hall. This was in the days when diplodocus was portrayed with a drooping tail, somewhat like a giant lizard, rather than with the perky, whiplash tail of modern versions. It became outmoded and was taken off the gallery. I discovered the model again recently, lying on top of a cupboard in a remote part of the collection, like a forgotten toy.
All the collections have to be constantly maintained. The specimens preserved in spirit must be 'topped up'. If unchecked, specialised insects will make a hearty meal of skins and feathers. The original British Museum, founded by Sir Hans Sloane in 1753, included mammal specimens, nearly all of which had been consumed by carpet beetle and moths by the beginning of the 19th century. But his dry plants survive today in a special herbarium. If they are kept carefully, pressed plants are as enduring as oil paintings.
An elephant seal skeleton and a stuffed black-maned lion of the Cape, a subspecies of lion that is now extinct in the wild
The hidden priesthood of the museum is becoming less of a closed order. It is already possible to take a tour into the Darwin Centre to see the great collections of animals preserved in spirit.
The green agenda means that the cataloguers of the natural world are recognised as being on the side of the angels. The collections of the Natural History Museum may yet prove to be the conscience for the world. What is preserved carefully in the collections in the vaults may have been foolishly extinguished by our own greedy species in the great outdoors.
Richard Fortey is the author of 'Dry Store Room No. 1: The Secret Life of the Natural History Museum' (£20, HarperPress). Order a copy for £18 plus £1.25 p&p from Telegraph Books (0870-428 4112; books.telegraph.co.uk). Natural History Museum: 020-7942 5000; nhm.ac.uk
telegraph.co.uk
