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Read more at: Twilight at the Museums
Playful Twilight at the Museum Graphics

Twilight at the Museums

12 February 2025

This February half term join us for an after-hours museum adventure. Grab your torch and explore our collections after dark with our space-themed family trail. Space Explorers Wednesday 19 Feb, 5-7pm. Free, drop-in. Ever since prehistoric painters used constellations to decorate rocks, people have always been interested in...


Read more at: New research on the circulation of scientific instruments in the Greek Enlightenment
Image of a globe.

New research on the circulation of scientific instruments in the Greek Enlightenment

12 February 2025

Last December, the Whipple Museum was delighted to host Dr Artemis Yagou of the Deutsches Museum, Berlin, for a one month research fellowship. Artemis is studying the circulation of scientific instruments used around the turn of the nineteenth century in Greece, then a province of the Ottoman Empire – the period before the...


Read more at: Open Call: Reimagining the Learning Gallery!
Learning Gallery

Open Call: Reimagining the Learning Gallery!

11 December 2024

The Whipple Museum of the History of Science is reimagining our Learning Gallery! We seek a creative practitioner with experience in community-focused installations to bring the “wow” factor to the Gallery, with an exciting and eye- catching new artwork to hang in the ceiling. We’ve been consulting our young audiences...


Read more at: 2025 Saturday Openings Announced!
Image of Main Gallery

2025 Saturday Openings Announced!

28 November 2024

The following Saturday openings have been announced for 2025! We will be open on: 19th April 17th May 21st June 19th July 16th August 20th September 18th October 15th November


Read more at: New Exhibition: The Cavendish Laboratory and the Birth of the Atomic Age
Glassblowing during the practical class at the Cavendish Laboratory.

New Exhibition: The Cavendish Laboratory and the Birth of the Atomic Age

26 November 2024

2024 marks 150 years since the founding of the Cavendish Laboratory of Experimental Physics. No one could have predicted in 1874 that Cambridge physics would give birth to the atomic age: that the electron and neutron would be discovered, and the atom itself split, on Free School Lane. From delicate glass vessels and...


Read more at: Saturday Opening on the third Saturday of every month!

Saturday Opening on the third Saturday of every month!

4 June 2024

Finally, the Whipple Museum will regularly be open on Saturdays! Starting on the 15th June, we will be open on the third Saturday of every month. Opening hours willl be 10:00 to 16:00. We will be open on: 19 October 16 November


Read more at: Jim Bennett (1947–2023)
Jim being measured in 1900: The New Age

Jim Bennett (1947–2023)

10 November 2023

Jim Bennett, pre-eminent historian of scientific instruments, former Curator of the Whipple Museum, former Fellow and Senior Tutor of Churchill College, internationally celebrated curator and museum director, has died in Oxford at the age of 76. James Arthur Bennett—always Jim to his friends—was born on 2 April 1947. After...


Read more at: Craftswomen Exhibition wins BSHS Prize
Craftswomen

Craftswomen Exhibition wins BSHS Prize

4 May 2023

We are delighted to announce that Craftswomen , our latest exhibition, has won the British Society for the History of Science Exhibiting Excellence Prize 2023 ! The judges were particularly impressed by the way the exhibition knitted HSTM scholarship into the content of the exhibition; foregrounding the stories of women...


Read more at: Craftswomen: Uncovering Hidden Labour in the History of Science
Craftswomen exhibition in the Main Gallery

Craftswomen: Uncovering Hidden Labour in the History of Science

24 August 2022

Craftswomen is a new exhibition at the Whipple Museum exploring the work of women in the British instrument trade between the 17th and 19th centuries. It exposes the often unseen work of the ‘craftswomen’ who made instruments for measuring, modelling and investigating the world. There are many famous women in the history...


Read more at: Doctrine of Signatures Exhibition online
Flyer of exhibition for doctrine of signatures

Doctrine of Signatures Exhibition online

2 August 2022

Please check out Xinyi Wen's online Doctrine of Signatures Exhibition , which was hosted by the Whipple Museum earlier this year. A walnut looks like a brain, and therefore could perhaps cure brain diseases — today, a traditional medicinal idea called ‘the doctrine of signatures’ is widely cited in contemporary pharmacy...


Opening Times

We are regularly open five days a week, 12.30 - 16:30.

And now open the third Saturday of every month!

Monday 12.30 - 16:30

Tuesday 12.30 - 16:30

Wednesday 12.30 - 16:30

Thursday 12.30 - 16:30

Friday 12.30 - 16:30

Selected Saturdays 10.00 - 16.00

 

Early May Bank Holiday
We will be closed on Monday, 5 May 2025 for the Early May Bank Holiday.