The National Museum of Science and Industry: An Overview

Abstract

THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY: AN OVERVIEW THOMAS WRIGHT The National Museum of Science and Industry is one of the world’s leading museums devoted to the history and public understanding of science, technology, and medicine. It owes its origin to the spirit and drive of Prince Albert, the profits of the Great Exhibition of 1851 (held in nearby Hyde Park), and the subsequent founding in 1857 of the South Kensington Museum, an institution concerned with the union of the arts and sciences in the pursuit of profitable industry. The collections that formed the South Kensington Museum are best described as the art collections and the rest. Through time and donation “the rest” began to coalesce into the science collections, which were immeasurably strengthened by the acquisition in 1884 of the Patent Office collection of patent models, documents, and arti­ facts. It is due to Bennet Woodcraft (1803—79), the assistant to the commissioners of patents, who was possessed of a strong sense of the historical importance of the artifacts that he saw around him, that such icons as the locomotives Rocket and Puffing Billy and Arkwright’s original spinning machinery were saved from oblivion. In 1885 the now clearly distinct science collections were accorded the title of the Science Museum, and in 1909 the art collections, now called the Victo­ ria and Albert Museum, were formally and administratively separated from the Science Museum. By this date the Science Museum was situated on the west side of Exhibition Road and the Victoria and Albert on the east. Whether this separation can be seen to be a mani­ festation of the two cultures at work or merely an administrative convenience is an issue that remains to be properly investigated. By 1977, through a number of building and in-filling programs, the Science Museum had essentially achieved its present-day layout, with 32,000 square meters of exhibition space. The original collec­ tions had been systematized and expanded to cover all the major Dr. Wright is assistant director of the Science Museum. He has written on the emergence and epistemology of engineering science in the 19th century and is at present researching British government efforts to encourage improvements in com­ puter software development.© 1996 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/96/3701-0007$01.00 147 148 Thomas Wright disciplines in science, engineering, transport, and medicine, the latter following the permanent loan to the museum of the unrivaled and extensive Wellcome Collection of medical artifacts in 1977. Because of pressures of space at South Kensington, in 1975 and 1983 the Science Museum founded the National Railway Museum at York and the National Museum of Photography, Film, and Television at Bradford, each being based on collections already held by the Sci­ ence Museum. In 1983 responsibility for the Science Museum (en­ compassing at that time York and Bradford as outstations) and its collections was transferred from central government to trustees by the National Heritage Act. The bulk of the funding was, and still is, provided from the public purse, although powers were vested in the trustees to raise and retain money by means of levying entrance charges and engaging in commercial activities such as retailing. In 1985 the old subtitle of the Science Museum, the National Museum of Science and Industry (NMSI), which had lain dormant for many years, was resurrected to recognize and underline the growing stature of York and Bradford and the emerging corporate nature of the institution. Because of Britain’s pivotal role in the Industrial Revolution, the NMSI, and the Science Museum in particular, holds large and author­ itative collections spanning the full range of science and technology. It employs a large number of specialist curatorial staff to undertake acquisition of both historical and contemporary material, with the accent on the contemporary. This need to keep as up-to-date as possible is due to the short life cycle of much modern scientific and technological material. With the growth of other specialized muse­ ums, the Science Museum has been able to discontinue collecting in some of its traditional areas and refocus on new ones. For instance, the decline of Britain...