In rural France, a new castle is taking shape!  It is being built using medieval techniques on a medieval timetable (an estimated total of 26 years). Read more »

What constitutes a history exhibit in our wired, hybrid, creative and contentious world?  Where do we see history in public, and what do its various manifestations have to do with the professional practice of public history per se?  That’s what NCPH’s new exhibit blog, “Off the Wall:  Critical Reviews of History Exhibit Practice in an Age of Ubiquitous Display,” is designed to help figure out.

The National Council for Public History has started a new blog, Off the Wall, which will feature regular short reviews by a cadre of talented observers from the fields of history, archeology, design, art, anthropology, and related areas, with commentary by a group of experienced public historians who will help to keep the critical conversation moving along.  Their first two posts are:

• Adina Langer’s thoughts on the British “Culture 24″ project as an example of a digital “museum of everything”
• Kevin Bartoy’s take on actor Tim Robbins reading the words of historian and gay activist Martin Duberman about the 1969 Stonewall Rebellion

From the first couple of reviews, this looks like it could become a very interesting and useful blog for me to keep abreast of things happening in the public history and museum realms.

Charlie Brown's pub showing curiosities brought back by sailors

The National Maritime Museum is on Flickr with a number of sets, including Animals at Sea, photos of the London Port area, and several concerning museum operations (such as conservation and installation).

This collection is another great visual history resource.  I hope that they continue to add images to their collections because I know that they have a great archive of vintage images.

The Science Museum’s new history of medicine website has recently been completed. According to Dr Robert Bud, the Principal Curator of Medicine,

In all it now presents 4000 new images of artefacts from the collections linked to 16 specialised themes on medicine across time, written by staff and other professional historians of medicine. Each theme is associated with bibliographies and interactives suitable for teaching at several levels.

So far, in my limited browsing of it, the Brought to Life website looks like a great resource for students and historians.

Also, all of the images on the site are available for download and use according to the creative commons license – it is defined here.

Coming to a bookstore near you soon!  Or, to pre-order, go to Amazon.

Science for the Nation is a unique look at the history of a great national institution as well as a study of the changing roles of museums and the perceived public role that a museum of science and technology plays within larger society. It illuminates the ways in which we think about the collecting and display of scientific objects, and explores the changing and often difficult relations between the state, business and industry, and museum funding. The essays also examine the Science Museum in the context of other national museums in London, and show the key differences affecting their chosen paths and individual development.

This is a great new volume … okay, I am partial because I helped to write it (see Chapter 3, entitled “The Science Museum and the Second World War”).  A perfect gift for anyone who is interested in the history of museums, especially during the 20th century.

William Jennings Bryan (seated at left) being interrogated by Clarence Seward Darrow, during the trial of the State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes, July 20, 1925.

Last November, a new donation of Scopes Trial Photos was made to the Smithsonian Archives and the Archives has posted them to a Flickr set about the trial.  Like the original set that was discovered in 2005, these new images are great visual historical resource for one of the key events in twentieth-century US history.

Clarence S. Darrow (center) standing near Rhea County Courthouse with unidentified man (left) and Arthur Garfield Hays (right), Dayton, Tennessee, probably July 20, 1925.

George Washington Rappleyea

Fred E. Robinson (at right) owned the drugstore where local business leaders persuaded schoolteacher John Thomas Scopes to consent to be charged with violating state law by teaching about evolution. The sign on the tabletop says: “AT THIS TABLE THE SCOPES EVOLUTION CASE WAS STARTED MAY 5, 1925.”

Check out all of the wonderful images out on Flickr!

This last week, as part of the St Cross Colloquia, I was recorded and podcasted!  If you want to download the presentation, click here.

While it was a good experience, I don’t like how my voice sounds on the recording and, for some reason, I kept saying “um” during the talk (especially, the first part of it).  Anyway, it is out there and is something to go on my CV …

Steampunk has arrived at the Museum of the History of Science!  In the world’s first purpose-built museum building is the world’s first museum-housed exhibition of steampunk art.  Curated by Art Donovan and Jim Bennett, this exhibition is a radical departure for the Museum of the History of Science, and is very successful in blending the artworks in the main special exhibition with a number of museum items displayed in the small basement gallery.

If you are in town, it is definitely worth a visit.  We visited the week after it opened on Sunday and we waited in line to enter the exhibition … a real rarity for the Museum!  Inside, you are confronted with a variety of steampunk artifacts (for some photos, click here).  The overall effect is quite interesting and completely different from any of the other exhibitions that the Museum has housed.  The time that we visited, it was very busy and we were not able to spend a lot of time … so, I really need to go back and spend more time examining some of the exhibits closer.

It is a wonderland for the imagination and highly recommended!

For more information, see:

• Exhibit Blog
• Exhibit Premier

For those who cannot get to Oxford, here is video (also available on the Museum’s site):

My entire DPhil in word cloud form!

via Wordle

This is the 13,000 words of my chapter of the forthcoming Science Museum centenary volume, Science for the Nation: Perspectives on the History of the Science Museum, represented in a word cloud.

To see a larger version of the image, just click …

via Wordle