Unexpectedly amazeballs: The Museum of London

 It wasn't my idea to go to the Museum of London...it was Danielle who found out about the place through Atlas Obscura. After looking at the website I decided to make it a requirement for my creative writing students, because it seemed to be focused on stories...of London's history obviously. It's free anyway so I thought what the hell. I do NOT regret adding this to the itinerary. It turns out most museums feature individual stories from some of history's "characters," but this particular joint really excelled at it. 

This museum seemed to be made for someone like me - just a grownup who still wants nothing more than to play pretend. It's got SO many recreations of historical environments...and there was even audio recreating the sounds and dialogue that would have been heard around the time of the bubonic plague. Honestly, when I was done going through this museum, I just wanted to turn around and go right back through it again. It's changing locations in the near future, so I can only hope it retains the same spirit in the new spot. For this trip, it was located near the Barbican - a kind of all purpose arts and entertainment venue that I never got a chance to visit. 

The museum displays cover a full history of London, from the prehistoric era, through the Roman and Norman conquests and beyond, covering the great fire of 1666 and all other major events affecting the city, as well as details about the culture and daily life of Londoners past. 

The prehistoric section featured this aurochs skull, which was about as big as me. Above are skulls and swords...museums in London are full of skulls and swords...and sometimes skeletons, to Danielle's delight of course.

The museum was full of these recreated environments, which you could actually walk through...including this kitchen from the Roman era. I am always enthralled by the kitchens. For creative writing purposes, it is often the hardest aspect of life to find in history books.

Something else that you rarely find in official history is information about dressing and beauty items...like these Roman era hair pins.

Throughout the museum, you would find these little rats - an interesting choice for a London mascot, and a clever way to direct kids' attention.

It wouldn't be a London museum without guns and suits of armor!

This museum also has its share of miniatures and models of buildings, which I love almost as much as full size recreated environments. This is the Rose Theater from the Elizabethan era.

This was a diorama of an 18th century coffee house, specifically Turk's Head Coffee House on the Strand, from which the items in the foreground came. The writer Samuel Johnson is on the left.

The section on the London fire was fantastic for creative writing, because it contained placards like these with actual characters whose stories the students could have a lot of fun developing. This one has potential fire starters, but there was another on heroes of the fire like the Dean of Westminster School and his students who worked to save the Church of St. Dunstan in the East.

There was an entire section on London daily life in the 18th and 19th centuries, including information on trades like cobbler and glassmaker, which again aren't easy to find for a creative writer trying to do research for a story.

This is actually a dollhouse, featured in the Victorian section, which was of course my favorite. This dollhouse reminded me of the one my grandma had. I loved that thing.

Of course I had to snag a picture of the Victorian dope. Unlike the Sherlock museum, they didn't leave out the opium wine, laudanum powder, paregoric and of course the cocaine. For the teeth, of course.

I really need to learn to take pics in dark places, because this pleasure garden was the shizzle. There was audio of conversations that would take place in the Victorian pleasure garden, mainly a lot of judging and gossip. So awesome.

Several mannequins were featured wearing the dress of the time. I'm telling you this place has everything a creative writer would need.

This is a cell taken from a debtors prison called Wellclose that was right next to the Tower...lots of criminal justice stuff here too.

My favorite part was the "Victorian Walk" in which you could stroll through a London street in the Victorian era, complete with a toy store, a coffee house, a printer - just about everything. The Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago has something similar, but this was bigger and better. Henrietta Scuttlington here welcomed you to the walk.

Recreated pub.

Recreated tobacco store. I don't know why the vices were the only pics that turned out among others along the somewhat dark walk. Maybe because they are fit for the dark?

A section was also devoted to women's contribution to history, and to the vote for women.

Christabel Squeakhurst was our suffragette rat. Very ladylike. And below another model...this time of a more modern London home. It actually did look a bit like my home stay in Ealing.

Teacher's note: What couldn't you use for learning at this place? History is an obvious one, but I can't stress enough how great this would be for creative writing, provided you provide a very specific prompt. If I had it to do again, I would assign students to choose a character from history, and write a scene in which history is being made that establishes time and place using the details provided in the museum.