Crystal Palace

 

Crystal Palace

Susannah moved to Crystal Palace late last year and sent some photographs of Crystal Palace Park, usually referred to simply as Crystal Palace. They awoke some memories in her cousin, Pamela, who remembers walking past the dinosaurs weekly as she and her brother and sister travelled to Crystal Palace for training. They were part of the pre-Olympic swimming squad.

The dinosaurs in Crystal Park Palace were unveiled in 1854 and are now Grade I listed. They were the first full-scale reconstructions of these animals.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Grade 1 listed buildings head the list for protection and preservation and are considered to be of ‘exceptional interest’ for their historical, architectural, and national importance. The dinosaurs share this distinction with Buckingham Palace, the Cenotaph, and the Houses of Parliament, among many more. Had Crystal Palace itself not been destroyed by fire in 1936, it, too, would have become a listed building.

There are around thirty sculptures, designed by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (1807-1894) with the guidance and expertise of the palaentologist Sir Richard Owen (1804-1892) Not all the sculptures are dinosaurs – there are amphibians, and mammals, too, like the long-extinct Irish Elk.

The models were constructed according to the knowledge at the time, and thus the Megalosaurus was depicted as a quadruped, when later scientific discoveries found that it was bipedal.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Naturally, wind and weather have affected the sculptures and repairs have been sympathetically conducted by skilled craftsmen. The Megalosaurus has had new teeth – twenty-two of them – a new nose and lower jaw, all carefully matched to the colour of the original.

Work on regenerating the park is due to begin this year, 2025.

Magpie Tales #87 Freeze-dried dinosaurs

Thanks go to Tess Kincaid who organises and hosts this meme J To read more Magpies please click here.

Image courtesy of http://www.ursuhlas weeklywanders.com/travel/a-day-in-the-life-yaowarat-chinatown-bangkok/

Freeze-dried dinosaurs

You’ve tried fugu? You’ve lived to tell the tale? So look now at the latest addition to our menu - something you’ve never seen before, let alone tasted!

Discovered in the permafrost by research scientists, these heretofore unknown dinosaurs have proved to be extraordinarily toothsome. Deep-fried in a mixture of herbs and spices, patrons declare this delicacy unsurpassed.

These herbivores, the size of pterosaurs, (strictly not dinosaurs, but who’s worrying?) provide protein-rich, low-calorific meals for the discerning gastronome. A dry white up-market wine is recommended as an accompaniment to this most unusual fare. A word of warning, though – this dish is not cheap. Supplies are limited and the prices reflect this. 

So, for that very special night out, indulge, if you dare, in this once-in-a-lifetime experience. (. . . and it may be your last lifetime experience!!)