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Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins 1854 paper on visual education applied to Crystal Palace Dinosaurs, with detailed descriptions.

Why Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins Created Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (FGS, FLS) was the sculptor who created the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs. Specifically, he created over thirty statues of prehistoric animals for the Crystal Palace and Park (Sydenham), [...]

Illuminations by C. T. Brock and Co, Sutton, Surrey, England. Advertising postcard for Brock’s Crystal Palace Fireworks and Illuminations, postmarked 1906.

Brock’s Illuminations 1906 Connected with Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

Brock’s Illuminations and Fireworks might be celebrating Crystal Palace Dinosaurs in their famous and rare 1906 postcard promoting their “Illuminations” at Crystal Palace. It’s possible, but I think that is [...]

Illustration of "ring species" concept, or Rassenkreis

Society for the Study of Speciation: Bibliographic Analysis using LLM

I provide data for an LLM-based analysis of the short-lived Society for the Study of Speciation (SSS), organised by Alfred Emerson, through three documents. […]

Ernst Mayr’s (1942) Systematics and the Origin of Species from the Viewpoint of a Zoologist. Title page

Systematics and the Origin of Species (1942) by Ernst Mayr

Ernst Mayr‘s (1904-2005) book, Systematics and the Origin of Species from the Viewpoint of a Zoologist was published in 1942 by Columbia University Press in their Columbia Biological Series. This [...]

HPSC0028 History of Life Sciences

A historical survey of the biological sciences from the Enlightenment to the present. What are the big names and big ideas? How were they received at the time and appropriated later? Who’s been ignored and […]

HPSC0011 STS Perspectives on Big Problems

The theme for 2026-27 will be “Food”. “Science and technology are two of the most important drivers of our world. As a field of study, STS is organised to interpret those activities in the past, […]

HPSC0010 History of Modern Science

This page is in development. Please return in September 2026. Until then, please enjoy these cartoons. What are these?

Richard the Lionheart statue outside UK Houses of Parliament

Nature of Gothic: A Chapter from The Stones of Venice (John Ruskin) | EGP

The famous essay by John Ruskin, The Nature of Gothic, first appeared as a chapter in his 1853 The Stones of Venice. This chapter proved immensely popular and took on a life of its own. […]

Evolution. Sewall Wright Taught Me, volume 1. Edited by Joe Cain. ISBN 9781906267025

Evolution: Sewall Wright Taught Me, volume 1 | EGP

Sewall Wright taught throughout his long career. Between 1926-1955, he worked at the University of Chicago. During this time, he developed and taught both undergraduate and graduate courses. By the early 1930s, Wright’s teaching load […]

Cain 2007 Regular Contact With Anyone Interested - Dobzhansky and friends on his new car

Regular Contact with Anyone Interested: Documents of Society for the Study of Speciation | EGP

Organising the Society for the Study of Speciation was a simple affair in 1939. The job of implementing its vision fell upon the entomologist Alfred Emerson, recruited to serve as Secretary. ‘The need was felt by […]

Professor Joe Cain

UCL Professor of History and Philosophy of Biology

Synthesis Period in Evolutionary Studies

Variation and Evolution in Plants (1950) by G. Ledyard Stebbins

George Gaylord Simpson’s “Night Thoughts on Leaving the American Museum of Natural History”

Ernst Mayr and the Biology of Birds Exhibit at AMNH

Major Features of Evolution (1953) by George Gaylord Simpson

Systematics and the Origin of Species (1942) by Ernst Mayr

Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

Why Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins Created Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

Brock’s Illuminations 1906 Connected with Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

GenAI in Research

Society for the Study of Speciation: Bibliographic Analysis using LLM

Systematics and the Origin of Species (1942) by Ernst Mayr

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Punch 1855 Cartoon Dreaming of Crystal Palace Dinosaurs

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HPSC Modules 2026-27

HPSC0028 History of Life Sciences

HPSC0011 STS Perspectives on Big Problems

HPSC0010 History of Modern Science

Open Access Titles | Euston Grove Press

Nature of Gothic: A Chapter from The Stones of Venice (John Ruskin) | EGP

Evolution: Sewall Wright Taught Me, volume 1 | EGP

Regular Contact with Anyone Interested: Documents of Society for the Study of Speciation | EGP