Crystal Palace Dinosaurs are located in Crystal Palace Park, in the south London area surrounded by Sydenham, Anerley, and Norwood.
Near the end of August 1862, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (1807-1894) wrote to Edward Trimmer (1827-1904) with a brief mention of the New Year’s Eve dinner in Iguanodon mould. The letter included a small illustration of […]
Crystal Palace Company formed in 1852 to purchase the glasshouse and remains of the 1851 Great Exhibition and somehow – no plan was clear at the start – restart it in another location. Sydenham was […]
Crystal Palace Company was good with its publicity for the grand opening of Crystal Palace and Park in June 1854. They worked hard to create a narrative that combined continuity (with the 1851 Great Exhibition […]
The famous engraving of New Year’s Eve Dinner in Iguanodon, published in Illustrated London News on 07 January 1854, appeared only one week after readers of the popular weekly magazine were given a glimpse inside […]
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert visited Crystal Palace Dinosaurs several times during the site’s construction in 1853 and 1854. In November 1853, the Royals visited the Model-Room, or Studio, of Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins and observed […]
In August 1852, The Illustrated London News published a first look at the new Crystal Palace attraction at Sydenham. This included a design vision for the revised glasshouse and the pleasure gardens in which that […]
No-one was surprised when Punch magazine celebrated the grand opening of the Crystal Palace in Sydenham, with opening ceremonies on 10 June 1854. Illustrated London News, its competitor on the weekly magazine market, did the […]
The cartoon depicting a man dreaming of monsters is one of two famous illustrations from Punch magazine referencing Crystal Palace Dinosaurs. In a previous post, I presented the other 1855 cartoon, “A visit to the antediluvian […]
Punch, or The London Charivari, was a British weekly magazine famous for its illustrated commentary and satire of politics and culture across the nineteen century and twentieth century. Mr Punch became a cultural icon: part […]
The Crystal Palace Company published a Guide to Crystal Palace and Park nearly every year in the first few decades after opening their attraction in Sydenham. These guides described main attractions – especially new additions […]
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