Tag: Work experience

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A year in review for #ExploreArchives | Library and Archives

It’s been a busy and varied year for the Museum’s Archives and Records Management service. There have been some staff changes, but our team of two staff (Kate Tyte and Ruth Benny) and some volunteers have still managed to answer 455 enquiries, host 133 visits and retrieve 955 items from the stores for our researchers to use.

Photo showing Kate Tyte seated at the back of the Archives with drawers open in front of her
Kate Tyte, Museum Archivist, working away in the stores

But just what are all these people researching? We’ve had enquiries about the Loch Ness Monster, the Challenger expedition, archaeological excavations, genealogy, meteorites, a botanical expedition to Peru in the 1950s, a model of a woolly rhinoceros, the origin and manufacture of glass jars for wet specimens in the 1800s, the Piltdown man hoax, UFOs (yes, you read that correctly) and taxidermied dogs.

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Guest post: What an experience! A working week at the Museum | Curator of Lepidoptera

One of the most important aspects of being a curator is not actually related to the Museum’s collections, but instead it’s ensuring that we encourage others to become interested in the natural world and the role we perform. So, this August gone, I was very lucky to have help from Billy Stockwell, a young wildlife enthusiast, who spent a few days at the Museum for work experience. Here’s his own tale of his time here, which he has kindly given me permission to reblog and I encourage you to read the rest of Billy’s adventures in the world of nature on his own blog:

The Natural History Museum is far more than just a museum. With 80 million specimens straddling 4 billion years of natural history it’s more of a microcosm of mother nature herself; a snippet from each stage of our planet’s life hitherto. Its collections are no less over-whelming, including prehistoric creatures worthy enough to feature in Spielberg’s Jurassic Park, to millions of butterfly specimens whose species inhabit our modern world today.

Photo showing hawkmoths in a drawer
Hawkmoths in the Museum’s collection

From a visitor’s perspective the most exciting aspects of the Museum may be the captivating dinosaur exhibition, the butterfly house, or even the Museum’s gift shop. But if you’re brave enough to venture behind the scenes you have another thing coming! And that’s exactly what I decided to do for my work experience a few weeks ago…

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