British Museum
Foundation date: 1753
Active: 1753 -
Function: Museum
History or description: The first national public museum in the world. From the beginning it granted free admission to all 'studious and curious persons'. Visitor numbers have grown from around 5,000 a year in the eighteenth century to nearly 6 million today.
Further information at http://www.britishmuseum.org/the_museum/history_and_the_building/general_history.aspx (accessed 27 August 2010)
Associated People
Employed William Albert Pinker
18 November 1872 - 5 April 1932
From 1 January 1873 he worked for the Department of Antiquities and was foreman of masons from 1894. Pinker undertook many highly skilled tasks not only for the Department of Antiquities but also for other areas of the British Museum, for example packing and moving large and fragile sculptures or lifting mosaics.
Employees included Charles Thomas Newton
1861 (Circa) - 1885
The first Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities
Employees included Cecil Harcourt-Smith
1879 - 1909
Curator and then Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities from 1904
Employees included A.S. Murray
1886 (Circa) - 1904
Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities, presume he succeeded Charles Newton
Employees included Arthur Hamilton Smith
1886 - 1925
Curator from 1886 and Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities from 1909-25
Employees included George Francis Hill
1893 - 1933 (Circa)
Assistant Keeper of Coins and Medals from 1893, Keeper from 1912. Director and principal librarian from 1933
Employees included Robert Lockhart Hobson
1899 (Circa)
Keeper of the Department of Ceramics and Ethnography
Employees included Herbert James Maryon
1939 (Circa) - 1955 (Circa)
Joined the staff before the Second World War and stayed until his retirement, worked as a technical adviser and involved in the conservation of the Sutton Hoo treasures
Members of committee included Charles Reed Peers
1933 (Circa)
A member of the Board of Trustees, duration of appointment unkown
Citing this record
'British Museum', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/organization.php?id=ann_1282918366, accessed 20 Jan 2020]
