The Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences, opened in 1912, is the geology museum of the University of Cambridge in England. It is part of the Department of Earth Sciences and is located on the University's Downing Site in Downing Street, central Cambridge, England.
The Sedgwick has a collection of more than 1 million rocks, minerals and fossils. The museum was built in memory of Adam Sedgwick and started with Dr John Woodward's bequest of his fossil collection in 1728 (still on display in its original cabinets).
The museum logo is based on the Iguanodon skeleton displayed by the entrance. A display board explains that the skeleton is incorrectly mounted in an upright posture rather than a horizontal one but as the upright posture is widely recognised on the logo it was decided to leave the specimen and logo as they are.
Displays include a gallery of minerals and gemstones, rocks collected by Charles Darwin on the 'Voyage of the Beagle', dinosaurs from the Jurassic and Triassic, and fossils from the local area including a hippopotamus from the nearby Barrington gravel pits.
The museum also has a small shop which sells souvenirs as well as geological equipment.
The Sedgwick is regularly used as a venue for events aimed at outreach and widening interest in Earth Sciences such as the annual Cambridge Science Festival.
Famous quotes containing the words museum, earth and/or sciences:
“Life is in the mouth; death is in the mouth.”
—Hawaiian saying no. 60, ‘lelo No’Eau, collected, translated, and annotated by Mary Kawena Pukui, Bishop Museum Press, Hawaii (1983)
“But money, wife, is the true Fuller’s Earth for reputations, there is not a spot or a stain but what it can take out.”
—John Gay (1685–1732)
“Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at very small expense. The power of invention has been conferred by nature upon few, and the labour of learning those sciences which may, by mere labour, be obtained, is too great to be willingly endured; but every man can exert some judgment as he has upon the works of others; and he whom nature has made weak, and idleness keeps ignorant, may yet support his vanity by the name of critic.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)