Collections · Cabinets of curiosity
Museums of the Strange
No Such Thing As A Fish runs on the kind of fact you'd find on a museum label nobody else reads. Here are the institutions the panel keeps wandering into: the grand, the niche, and the gloriously specific.
30 places in this collection
- 1Natural History Museummuseum · United Kingdom
Peter Whitehead who was working in the Natural History Museum and he was a biologist and he was just obsessed with finding this picture of this herring.
Open this place → - 2British Museummuseum · United Kingdom
I took Craig Glende, who is the Guinness World Records Editor-in-Chief, to the British Museum to meet the world's oldest ghost to give it a Guinness World Record.
Open this place → - 3Science Museummuseum · United Kingdom
It was built in 1928 and there's a campaign the Science Museum are launching to rebuild it.
Open this place → - 4National Gallerymuseum · United Kingdom
All the art of the National Gallery was sent to a cave in Wales.
Open this place → - 5Crab Museummuseum · United Kingdom
Is it the guy who runs the crab museum in Margate?
Open this place → - 6New York Public Librarymuseum · United States
In 1938, Cab Calloway published Cab Calloway's Cat-A-Log, A Hepster's Dictionary, which was the first dictionary written by an African American, and it was the Jive Language Reference Book of the New York Public Library.
Open this place → - 7American Museum of Natural Historymuseum · United States
He was at the American Museum of Natural History, and he came across some bones in the ethnographic department, which was his father's skeleton, which Peary had simply sold to the museum as a kind of display piece.
Open this place → - 8British Librarymuseum · United Kingdom
The British Library has a collection of over 60 million newspapers and none of them can catch fire.
Open this place → - 9National Portrait Gallerymuseum · United Kingdom
One of the suffragettes, Anne Hunt, walked into the National Portrait Gallery and stopped in front of a portrait of Thomas Carlyle, painted by Millais, and she slashed it.
Open this place → - 10Icelandic Penis Museummuseum · Iceland
Can I just interject here to say how angry I was that you chose the one week I was away to discuss the Icelandic Penis Museum?
Open this place → - 11Louvremuseum · France
Was it an underground train system that was one of the first of its kind, underground in Paris, that led to the Louvre?
Open this place → - 12Disgusting Food Museummuseum · Sweden
The Disgusting Food Museum in Malmö, Sweden collects food that is utterly horrible.
Open this place → - 13Poundland Museummuseum · United Kingdom
Keith Smith, who set up Poundland with his son, came back to England and bought a house — Luddstone Hall.
Open this place → - 14Imperial War Museummuseum · United Kingdom
The Imperial War Museum has an amazing page all about the various different Hobart's Funnies and all about the different weird things they could do.
Open this place → - 15National Rail Museummuseum · United Kingdom
The National Rail Museum in York has a collection of 610 model railway vehicles all made by the same man, who was called James Peel Richards, 1902 to 99.
Open this place → - 16Titanic Museummuseum · United States
Three people were recently hospitalised after being hit by an iceberg at a Titanic Museum.
Open this place → - 17Bible Walk MuseumUnited States
The problem that the Bible Walk Museum has is that they don't like people liking that.
Open this place → - 18Library of CongressUnited States
It was pointed out that all of the works that they pointed out were in his library were also in the Library of Congress.
Open this place → - 19Horniman MuseumUnited Kingdom
The Horniman Museum in South London weren't getting emails for ages.
Open this place → - 20V&A MuseumUnited Kingdom
The V&A Museum did a Titanic exhibit, and apparently this book, Titan, was on the Titanic as part of the reading library.
Open this place → - 21Museum of Modern ArtUnited States
The Museum of Modern Art in New York has had a few of these over the years.
Open this place → - 22National Museum of ComputingUnited Kingdom
I went to the National Museum of Computing in Bletchley last weekend.
Open this place → - 23Van Gogh MuseumNetherlands
Two very famously stolen Van Gogh paintings, which were taken back in 2002 from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, were recovered, and they were found in Italy near Naples in the property of a famous cocaine mafia cartel.
Open this place → - 24Museum of LondonUnited Kingdom
The Museum of London has a few relics from the execution of Charles I, including a shirt that belonged to Charles — all his bits of clothing were torn off him and handed round.
Open this place → - 25British Motor MuseumUnited Kingdom
The smelliest car at the British Motor Museum belongs to Queen Elizabeth II.
Open this place → - 26Ashmolean MuseumUnited Kingdom
His name is Robert Plott, a founding curator at the Ashmolean Museum.
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- 29Brunel MuseumUnited Kingdom
I visited recently the Brunel Museum in Rotherhithe, which, if you are passing, is really cool.
Open this place → - 30Lyme Regis MuseumUnited Kingdom
The Lyme Regis Museum, you can go and learn some stuff about Mary Anning, and it is in the place where she was born.
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