This episode is brought to you by the Field Museum in Chicago, Illinois and the Museum Fur Naturkunde in Berlin, Germany.
2018 marks the hundred and twenty-fifth year anniversary of the Field Museum.
By 1893 we had raised funds amassed collections from the World's Fair,
developed exhibit cases for display to the public and were ready to open our doors for visitors and researchers alike.
But the history of Natural History collections like ours is much older than any one institution.
People have been collecting and categorizing objects from the natural world as long as we've had a curiosity about our planet,
and it's thanks to museums that many of these collections still exist today.
What are you wearing?
Lederhosen...
Take Germany for example. The Museum fur Naturkunde in Berlin opened its doors to the public in 1889
But the history of the museum dates back to 1810, when the King of Prussia
Friedrich Wilhem III unified three smaller museum collections into Berlin University,
and since that time the collections in Berlin have endured major political changes
and two world wars. They sustained serious damage from allied bombs in 1945,
which left the entire eastern wing obliterated until well after the reunification of Germany in 1990.
I can't even begin to imagine what sort of stories are in a collection like that.
I'd love to visit, but it's not like there's some secret door that connects us all across space and time.
No raccoons allowed.
Oh, sorry buddy..
Guys we're in the museum for Naturkunde!
Where do I even begin?
Okay, for starters the Museum fur Naturkunde is notable not just because it's more than 200 years old and houses collections from some of
the 18th century's greatest scientists, like Alexander von Humboldt.
He was the first person to describe the phenomenon of human-induced climate change in
1800, and again in 1831.
This place revolutionized the museum field by not putting all of their objects on display when they opened to the public in 1889.
Before this, museum collections were more seen as cabinets of curiosity places where wealthy people and academics could put out all their amassed
materials and charged whomever to come see them.
Instead, Berlin recognized the importance of carefully selecting certain items for display while others were intended for scientific research.
Even if you've never visited, you're probably familiar with some of the more famous objects in Berlin's collections --
including this incredibly unfortunate but adorable ocelot.
To be fair it's like 200 years old,
and it would be many more years before Carl Akeley would show up and revolutionize the world of taxidermy.
But, if you can believe it, an even more famous specimen in Berlin's collection is this Archaeopteryx.
It's actually known as the Berlin specimen and was brought here to the museum in 1880.
Today it's one of the most recognizable fossils ever discovered.
Archaeopteryx is remarkable because it's considered to be a transitional species between birds and dinosaurs
Unlike a bird it has teeth, wings with claws, and a long dinosaur-like tail that's covered in feathers.
Between 1909 and 1913
Paleontologists working in Tanzania discovered around 250 tons of fossilized bones that they brought back to Berlin,
including one of the largest dinosaurs ever found.
At the time it was considered to be a species of brachiosaurs,
but today it's known simply as Giraffatitan.
Even though it's a composite skeleton of two juveniles of about the same size, it still holds the current world record for the tallest
dinosaur on display in any Museum in the world.
And there are still 30 crates from the Tanzania expedition that have yet to be opened.
Not due to a lack of interest, but rather a shortage of funding and trained professionals.
But now scientists at the Berlin museum are using non-invasive technologies like CT scans to learn more about what's inside.
Unfortunately World War II brought change and progress to a sudden end.
Jewish scientists were barred from working and researching in the collection in 1938
due to a decree from the Nazi state, and in February 1945
a fire bomb destroyed the majority of the eastern wing, taking a thousand specimens along with it.
Today you can still see the damage of the attacks throughout the collection - and it's ironic that most of the items that were evacuated
prior to the bombing and subsequent fires were ultimately lost or destroyed,
while those that remained in the building could be salvaged.
But once the war ended the Museum fur Naturkunde was the first to reopen its doors to the public on the 16th of September, 1945.
The eastern wing of the building remained in ruins after the war, and many other projects and programs were discontinued.
Ultimately, the museum was geographically located in East Germany and therefore part of the German Democratic Republic,
which put it on the eastern side of the Berlin wall when that was erected in 1961.
Scientists at the Museum were then limited in who they could collaborate with,
where they could conduct work outside of Germany, and in what journals the research could be published.
But they found ways to continue their work. One expedition in 1967 involved bringing back tons of corals from a project with Cuba,
and then they had to navigate the networks of global political borders to safely deposit the specimens into the museum.
Then in 1990 the Berlin Wall came down in the city began its reunification.
Reconstruction of the east wing started in November of 2006 and in 2010 to coincide with the museum's 200th anniversary,
the east wing finally reopened. But not wanting to forget the past or the actions that ultimately led to its destruction,
the architects designed to the exterior facade in a way that
differentiates between the new construction, and the original building through a subtle change of materials and color.
But even as the buildings change, the collections remain at the center of the museum.
For instance, this is where you'll find one of the largest and oldest fish collections in the world,
assembled by Dr. Marcus Bloch in the mid- to late 1700s.
Today it's one of the most technically advanced Museum collection buildings in any institution, and houses more than a million specimens.
And with its floor-to-ceiling glass walls, this space is even accessible to the public
All our Natural History Museums are basically the origin of the academic enlightenment.
That's what our collections hold.
So that gives us some
responsibility, doesn't it?
Yeah?
This is Dr. Johannes Vogel. He's the director general for the Museum fur Naturkunde, Berlin.
E: We've spent a lot of time thinking about the history and considering the history of this institution.
It's been around for so long, but I'm more interested in your perspective on the future of the Museum fur Naturkunde.
What would you say is going to be your primary goal in the immediate future?
J: We need to reconfigure how science and society are going to interact to face the challenges of the world.
Poverty ,climate security, food security water security, biodiversity security
So we need to become organizations that are facilitators of a science
Society dialog and that are pacemakers for change. That's what we need to do.
What are some of the discoveries or advancements that you're looking forward to the most in the future?
In terms of like the technology we have now that obviously didn't exist 200 years ago.
This is probably the most exciting time for our type of Institute's not just that I think
Society needs places where it can build community around the issue of nature
but also our collections have become
immensely valuable suddenly through technological and societal advances to help us not only to
Understand it, but also potentially to predict
How human actions can impact the environment and in return impact us as humans.
The biggest infrastructure to explain the world are the Natural History Museum's we are still a way off to have others recognizing that
And I would argue
Change for others to recognize that has to come from us, and then I think eventually
They will recognize outside
What we are good for the Museum fur Naturkunde has had a long and complicated history
And like all museums it can give us a snapshot for what we humans value at every moment in time
over the next few episodes
We're going to spend some time talking with scientists at the museum about their research what they value and how the Museum fur Naturkunde
has become a part of a global consortium of Natural History Museum's helping to serve as
institutions of knowledge discovery and change in the 21st century
So has brains on it