Tring

Tring is a small town in Hertfordshire, England. It's about 30 miles northwest of London, or about 45 minutes by train. If you take the train be prepared to wait a long time for the bus into town or just walk the 2 miles. I walked, I saw trees, fields, houses, and the usual stuff one sees in England, nothing remarkable or even picture worthy.

Grass Car, London 2010

Not even the grass car in the above picture. I saw this in London a few days ago so I thought I would throw it into the blog just in case anyone missed it on Facebook. It has nothing whatsoever to do with this blog except that I didn't see it in Tring.

St. Peter and St. Paul, Tring

The local old church was beautiful in that really old sort of way, but one comes to expect every town in England to have a really old beautiful church. So why did I visit this homely little town. It turns out that a very famous American's grandfather lived in this town at least for a few years, Lawrence Washington, yep George's granddad. Well, being the great American that I am, I had to visit.

The Natural History Museum at Tring

Actually, I came to visit this place. I didn't know about Lawrence until I read it on wikipedia. This is the Natural History Museum at Tring. It's been a part of the NHM since 1937.




The Rothschilds' built this place to house their oldest son's hobby. Walter (the oldest son) was a collector, some say he was obsessed, some say he was just a little eccentric. I think he was an obsessed eccentric with really great parents.




If my parents are reading this, I'm not trying to say that you were in anyway terrible parents, maybe just a little stingy with the money, that's all. I mean how much could something like this cost anyway.



Below is a picture of Lord Rothschild. I borrowed this picture and most of the facts for this post from the NHM or Wikipedia websites. Please visit them as they covered his life in much more detail than I could.

Lord Walter Rothschild

Rothschild with his famed zebra (Equus burchelli) carriage, which he drove to Buckingham Palace to demonstrate the tame character of Zebras to the public

Apparently at the age of seven Walter announced to his family that he was going to own a museum. He started collecting at seven and never stopped. He amassed the largest private zoological collection in history. At it's peak, his collection included 300,000 bird skins, 200,000 birds' eggs, 2,250,000 butterflies, and 30,000 beetles, as well as thousands of specimens of mammals, reptiles, and fishes. Apparently he had to sell off most his bird collection to the American Museum of Natural History as one of his mistresses was blackmailing him.

Fennec Fox, NHM at Tring

Now I'm thinking that this little guy hopes that the Night at the Museum movie series is true and he is able to run and hide every once in a while. I'm not sure what the heads (below) would do as they can't be terribly mobile.




Did I tell you that Lord Rothschild is the main reason that I am in London today. Walter inherited the majority of his parents fortune and also his father's title of Baron. He used this money to send expeditions to the far reaches of the world to collect animals of all sorts. I would estimate that at least 85% of the moth specimens I am working on came from these expeditions.



He also hired numerous people to identify all the critters. Remember now that these animals were all collected around the early 1900's. At that time all the insects from the nether regions of the world were new to science so he employed numerous people to identify these specimens. Some species were named several times as each identifier recognised it as new. So that's why I'm here, to help sort all those names out.



This is only a small selection of the animals on display. He even has a whole row of cases dedicated to the domestic dog. If you ever get a chance, and you enjoy looking at zoological stuff, Tring is a must stop.

Location:High St,Tring,United Kingdom