Wallace News Blog

Bill Bailey becomes Wallace Fund Patron!

George Beccaloni — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:50:53 +0000

Exciting news just in! The famous British comedian Bill Bailey has very kindly agreed to become the patron of the Wallace Memorial Fund! Bill is very interested in natural history and in South-East Asia and is a big fan of Wallace. In fact, such is his interest that he will be presenting a two part BBC series about Wallace which will be filmed this year in preparation for the anniversary next year.

Catalogue of the NHM's Wallace Family Papers now available

George Beccaloni — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:45:37 +0000

A pdf manuscript catalogue of the Natural History Museum's Wallace Family Archive has been added to the WCP's database of documents, with permission from the NHM's library. This catalogue lists and describes the c. 5000 Wallace-related documents purchased by the Museum in 2002 from Wallace's grandsons.

Wallace's annotated copy of the 1858 Darwin-Wallace paper on natural selection

George Beccaloni — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 11:26:16 +0000

Probably the historically most important of all enclosures to any of Wallace's correspondence in the Wallace Family Archive at the Natural History Museum, London, is an offprint of 1858 Darwin-Wallace paper on natural selection - the scientific article which launched the evolution revolution. This paper is widely regarded as being one of the most important scientific papers of all time, and what is special about the NHM's copy is that it was owned and annotated by Wallace.

Alfred Russel Wallace's address books are now available for downloading

George Beccaloni — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 21:52:22 +0000

If you are interested in downloading a copy of Alfred Russel Wallace's address books go to the Wallace Correspondence Project site, here - http://wallaceletters.info/content/alfred-russel-wallaces-address-books-are-now-available-downloading

Correspondents listed include Charles Darwin, Rajah James Brooke (ruler of Sarawak) and hundreds of other, many of whom were very famous at the time.

Volunteers needed to help the Wallace Correspondence Project at the NHM in London

George Beccaloni — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 17:21:34 +0000

The Wallace Correspondence Project is looking for 2 enthusiastic volunteers to join their small team at the Natural History Museum, London, for one day a week, to assist with various project tasks.

The WCP is a three year project to locate, catalogue and summarise all known correspondence of the great Victorian naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace. Wallace’s greatest claim to fame is that he was the co-discoverer of natural selection with Charles Darwin.

Alfred Russel Wallace's Last Will & Testament

George Beccaloni — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 23:23:39 +0000

In 2010 Wallace's grandson John very kindly donated about 600 assorted documents which had belonged to his grandfather to the Wallace Family Archive at the Natural History Museum, London.

Can you identify this gentleman?

George Beccaloni — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 09:54:22 +0000

I have been trying unsuccessfully to identify the sitter in the photo to the right and wondered whether anyone might recognise him? The image was scanned from a CDV (carte de visite) which Wallace owned and an inscription on the back reads "from a photograph by Mr Fry 1852" (Fry was a professional photographer).

New book on Wallace.

George Beccaloni — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:16:38 +0000

A colleague of mine, Alexander Reeuwijk, from The Netherlands together with the well known British travel writer Redmond O'Hanlon, recently published a book called "Wallace, Darwin and Others". The cover looks nice, but that's about as much as I will be able to say about it since it's written in Dutch! Alex says that is almost sold out already, so it must be good! If you want more information about it, and can read Dutch, then go here: http://www.uitgeverijatlas.nl/result_titel.asp?Id=3153

Join the Wallace Forum!

George Beccaloni — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 10:51:16 +0000

The Wallace Forum is (perhaps not surprisingly!) the World's first Forum dedicated to Wallace. I would like to encourage EVERYONE who is interested in any aspect of his life and work to join and share their thoughts and information with other interested people.

Volunteers Needed to Transcribe Alfred Russel Wallace's Letters!

George Beccaloni — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:03:16 +0000

The Wallace Correspondence Project is looking for dedicated volunteers to help them transcribe letters written by Wallace, as well as letters sent to him from his many correspondents. Ideally they would like volunteers who already have experience of transcribing (sometimes difficult) Victorian handwriting, but enthusiasm and persistence are more important, and they will provide a palaeography guide!