Last weekend over 30 delegates gathered at the Sedgwick Museum to hear 12 talks about Darwin’s collecting practices, observations and experiments. The topics presented at the ‘Darwin in the Field’ conference ranged from the 1831 fieldtrip to North Wales with Adam Sedgwick that Darwin went on to learn geological skills to Darwin’s last major piece of fieldwork at Glen Roy in Scotland that is considered to be his greatest scientific failure.
Darwin’s work on the Beagle featured prominently with talks focussing on the field notebooks he used record his observations in and specific finds, places and theories. His collections of coral reef material, fossil bones of large extinct creatures and fossils from the Falkland Islands were all discussed. Other presentations looked at Darwin’s theories of igneous petrology, transmutation of species and transoceanic dispersal. The conference was an opportunity for lively discussion between scientists, historians and museum professionals about the often neglected, practical aspects of Darwin’s work.
A full list of speakers and topics can be found here. Photographs are courtesy of John van Wyhe.
This Saturday marked the Sedgwick Museum’s latest dramatic debut. The street theatre company, Pif Paf, set up camp outside the Museum to perform ‘Under the floorboards’ a musical adventure through geological time for all ages. The show starred Pete Gunsen as Professor Adam Sedgwick, the geologist who inspired the creation of this museum.
This fantastic voyage into the Earth beneath Cambridge lasted for half an hour, its highlights included a singing volcano and Professor Sedgwick’s epic battle with a glacier.
Plans are afoot to put on more from Pif Paf in the future, keep your eyes on the Sedgwick Museum website for details of upcoming performances.
The Darwin the Geologist exhibition was finally unveiled in an opening ceremony this evening. The event brought together many of the people who have helped the project along the way for an exclusive early viewing of the new exhibition.
The evening’s guest of honour was Professor Janet Brown, Harvard University historian of science and the author of the two-volume Charles Darwin biography, Voyaging and The Power of Place. In a short ceremony she unveiled the bust of young Darwin that will now hang over the north end of the museum gallery and declared the exhibition open.
The exhibition will be open to the public tomorrow, Tuesday 7th July.
The Sedgwick Museum has been closed this week while staff and contractors put the final touches on the new Darwin the Geologist exhibition.
After months of preparation, the Darwin the Geologist exhibition is entering the last stages of preparation. For weeks now, curators have been gathering and checking the objects for display. The exhibition team has been hard at work polishing the story you’ll eventually be able to read as you wander round the exhibition and an expert group of programmers has prepared electronic interactives for you to try when you visit.
This week is when it all comes together. The barrier that sectioned off the area of the museum under development has been removed. Our designers and printers are preparing the display panels and contractors are installing them inside the museum’s cases. Loans are coming into the museum from near and far. There’s still a lot of work to do before the exhibition opens to the public on 7th July, Sedgwick Museum staff will be working through the weekend to make sure it is ready in time.
