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It&#8217;s Christopher Wren&#8217;s birthday today and our libraries are fortunate enough to be located quite close to Wren&#8217;s work (as Guildhall, and St. Paul&#8217;s librarian, Jo illustrates here).
Today Wren is known for his architecture, particularly the wonderful St. Paul&#8217;s Cathedral, but this tumblarian likes to think of him as the guy who made a transparent beehive (and maybe got chased by bees). 
As there is no image handy of Wren being chased by bees (and I looked), here is a detail from the wonderful Penny Dreadful Mysteries of London, with Wren&#8217;s cathedral peeking out from behind the smog of Victorian London, and what appears to be a Goth detective on his way to solve crime.

It’s Christopher Wren’s birthday today and our libraries are fortunate enough to be located quite close to Wren’s work (as Guildhall, and St. Paul’s librarian, Jo illustrates here).

Today Wren is known for his architecture, particularly the wonderful St. Paul’s Cathedral, but this tumblarian likes to think of him as the guy who made a transparent beehive (and maybe got chased by bees). 

As there is no image handy of Wren being chased by bees (and I looked), here is a detail from the wonderful Penny Dreadful Mysteries of London, with Wren’s cathedral peeking out from behind the smog of Victorian London, and what appears to be a Goth detective on his way to solve crime.

, #christopher wren #london #St Paul's Cathedral #penny dreadful #city of london libraries

God bless the King.

What many people don’t know, because most reprints omit this, for reasons, is that whilst remarking on the waistcoat, Pepys did so in a manner most reminiscent of that fine classic motion picture Mean Girls. Fact.*

Related (have your library card handy): Mary G. Secrets from the Royal Wardrobe. Daily Mail [serial online]. July 5, 2014:14. Available from: UK & Ireland Reference Centre, Ipswich, MA.

*The legal team (Bob) would like me to stress this is not a fact. Though we can speculate this could have been written in a secret diary yet to be found.

(Source: twitter.com)

, #London Metropolitan Archives #waistcoats #city of london libraries online resources #history #fashion

Apparently it’s a national day of dessert somewhere out there. We don’t have national dessert days, what with making time for all the tea and biscuits, but let us share some desserty goodness anyway. 

Held by Guildhall Library, pictured above is a scrapbook of cuttings and handwritten recipes compiled by Nina Gladys Barker (née Alexander) who was born in the late 1880s, wife of Robert Beacroft Barker, merchant and politician in Jamaica. The recipes were probably compiled between 1940 and 1960, many of Jamaican, origin most of them sweet. Mmm, time for a cuppa. 

View item on catalogue, and view images on Pinterest.

, #dessert #scrapbook #guildhall library #london #national dessert day
Tonight over at Barbican Library, join us for an event on black scientists and inventors to celebrate black history during the month of October. Admission is free, and the event takes place from 6 to 7:30pm. 
The good looking fellow pictured above is Ernest Everett Just, pioneering biologist and academic, and science writer. He was described by Charles Drew (another notable African-American scientist) as &#8220;a biologist of unusual skill and the greatest of our original thinkers in the field.&#8221;

Tonight over at Barbican Library, join us for an event on black scientists and inventors to celebrate black history during the month of October. Admission is free, and the event takes place from 6 to 7:30pm. 

The good looking fellow pictured above is Ernest Everett Just, pioneering biologist and academic, and science writer. He was described by Charles Drew (another notable African-American scientist) as “a biologist of unusual skill and the greatest of our original thinkers in the field.”

, #black history month #black history #london #Barbican #ernest everett just

It’s the month of Halloween (also known as Oktoobro?) and we (me, just me, right here, in the nerd corner) have put together a list of absolutely frightful dvds you ought to borrow from your library (or watch because you already own them if you live on Tumblr).

The Mummy and The Mummy Returns do not feature on this list. It’s a strange story actually. We buy these dvds and they just seem to… disapeeeear. We don’t have the third movie in the series because what movie are you talking about? The one that never happened? That’s what I thought.

, #halloween #supernatural #sleepy hollow #ghostbusters #city of london libraries

Felons, Folios and Family: Richard Smyth of London

Professor Vanessa Harding will be giving a talk on Richard Smyth, a city law officer who was also a noted bibliophile, amassing a collection of 8,000 works. His books and writings illuminate his career in the Guildhall courts, his contacts in the book trade, and his circle of friends and family in and around London.

It’s a very booky wooky event and Smyth would probably be played by Benedict Cumberbatch in the movie of his life… maybe.

For booking details!

, #london #guildhall #guildhall library #bibliophile #history
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