Tring Natural History Museum Visit

I was vaguely aware of the Natural History Museum at Tring through walking The Ridgeway. The influence of the Rothschild family is hard to miss since It's arrival in the late 19th Century. The family dominated the World finance and banking industry, becoming influential politicians and investors. The Rothschilds transformed Tring, providing.   employment, housing and improved the social welfare of residents. I was reminded about the museum after listening to a very funny podcast by the Comedian Mark Steel. Mark visits various places across the UK poking good natured  fun at their curious behaviours and ways. I have posted the link below for the Tring episode which is well worth a listen!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001bssk

The Museum is just off the High Street.Directions are painted on to a house wall , which sadly we missed.....

Although born into the prominent Banking family Walter Rothschild (1868-1937) had little interest in the world of finance. Born in 1868, Walter became interested in nature when he was very young.Aged just seven he told his parents he was going to have a museum. By the age of ten he had collected enough exhibits to start one in the garden shed. It was a collection that was to expand astronomically. The collection included 2,000 mounted mammals and a similar number of mounted birds, two million butterflies and moths, 300,000 bird skins, 144 giant tortoises, 200,000 birds' eggs and 30,000 books. His father built him a museum on the edge of Tring Park as a twenty-first birthday present.

Amazingly admission to the museum is free, donations are welcomed of course. Split into 6 galleries over several floors there are over 4900 exhibits to see. Apparently there are still thousands more back at the house.  

In Gallery 1 we are greeted by a huge smiling Polar Bear. Walter Rothschild bought this polar bear from the Northeast Siberian Trading Company. This specimen is one of many animals which were traded between North America and Siberia. It is thought to have provided the inspiration for Raymond Briggs' book, The Bear.We meet 'Simon' who is the Museum Expert and features on the Mark Steel Podcast. He is extremely helpful and gives us further insight on what to expect.

There is an incredible amount to see and take in, its quite overwhelming actually. The oldest specimen is thought to be the Emperor Penguin. It was collected on an Antarctic expedition between 1839 and 1843 by Joseph Dalton Hooker, who was a famous botanist and one of Charles Darwin's closest friends.  

There are even a pair of Dodo's, the extinct flightless bird that only existed on the island of Mauritius. These though are composite exhibits made up from the parts from parts of other birds put together. As mentioned previously Walter wasn't too interested in banking. He spent much of his time and money employing collectors to travel the world in search of new specimens.He also hired taxidermists, a librarian and, most importantly, professional scientists to work with him to curate and write up the resulting collections.

As well as the thousands of specimens Walter put on display, the collection included over a million more used for research behind the scenes, notably 300,000 birds and over a million butterflies and moths. 

Not surprisingly the banking empire suffered financially and he was finally allowed to do his own thing aged 40.

 

There are animals here of literally all shapes and sizes.  There are wooden shuttered cases of all sorts of insects. Beetles, Butterflies, Stick Insects, Moths, Centipedes and a wealth of other creepy crawlies.The collection of Humming Birds is equally as stunning. Some no bigger than a thumbnail in size, all the colours of the rainbow.  

In Gallery 6 is the strange looking Cassowary, a large, flightless bird found in Australia and New Guinea. Walter was fascinated by them and kept 64 live cassowaries roaming free in nearby Tring Park. There are reports of one of them attacking a horse! 

Walter kept 144 giant tortoises in his lifetime, including Aldabra and Galápagos tortoises. (in the Indian Ocean)His aim was in part to protect them from hunting and potential extinction in their native habitat.There is a life-size replica of his giant tortoise in the Rothschild Room. 

Visitors are encouraged to have their picture taken on it .Re-creating the famous one of him riding a Giant Tortoise, and steering  with a piece of lettuce on a stick. Well it would be rude not too wouldn't it? 

He also managed to train Zebra's to pull a carriage. (I'm told by Simon it is incredibly difficult to train a Zebra).  The picture below is actually outside The Royal Albert Hall.

 

The one thing that I really wanted to see(and there are many) were the Fleas dresses as Mexicans. Yes you did read that correctly. These fleas were purchased in Mexico around 1905. They were handmade by women as a form of folk art and sold to tourists as souvenirs. 

By looking through the magnified lens (pictured left) it is possible to see the two fleas in Mexican costume. The male is complete with a type of white Sombrero and suit.The female has a long dress and is carrying a parasol, quite amazing. They are said to have been made in 1905 with fleas caught from local cats and dogs. 

Weighing in at a whopping 6 tons is the giant Elephant Seal They are often bigger and heavier .It is so large that it won't fit in the display cabinets. Instead it is perched on top. Further along hanging from the ceiling is the skeleton from said creature.This particular seal came from South Georgia.

What an incredible place to visit! Spent a few hours trying to take it all in, could have spent double that. To say that Walter Rothschild is an understatement. A bit like saying Adolph Hitler wasn't very nice. There is something of interest wherever you look. I'm sure if and when I go back, there will be things that I don't recall seeing before. 

To finish off the Tring visit had a wander along the High Street. We saw both Hardware stores and the lone taxi mentioned by Mark Steel. We never made it to the Railway Station though. Nor did we encounter any of the numerous species of edible Dormouse (Glis Glis) introduced to Tring by who else but Walter...