Museum of London

The Museum of London is one of the world’s largest urban history museums and tells the story of London and its people from prehistoric times to the present day.

The Museum’s Galleries of Modern London show how the energy of Londoners shaped this global city over the past 350 years. 7,000 objects and show-stopping interactives tell the story of the city’s tumultuous history, from the Great Fire of 1666 to today’s 21^st century capital.

Material from the Museum’s Connected Earth collection can be seen in the People’s City and World City galleries. The collection items on display include an iconic illuminated Model K2 telephone kiosk, which houses an array of objects, ephemera and interactive elements. The kiosk also features screens showing the films Fairy of the Phone and Go Ahead Please from BT Archives.

The rest of the Museum’s Connected Earth collection (including the artefacts below) are held in storage and is accessible to visitors by appointment. Objects and ephemera from the collection can also be viewed on Exploring 20^th Century London.

News the the from Museum of London.

Rothschild telephone (1890s) : a cut above the rest

This telephone was created especially for the Rothschild's family home in London by the Ericsson factory.

The Rothschilds were, and remain, a family of very successful bankers. As the early telephone industry developed they followed an interest in the technology by investing in telephone companies. This telephone was both elegant and practical. It connected their Piccadilly mansion to their banking house in the City of London. It was a standard model but made using ivory and gold gilt. Its legs also acted as a magnet for the ringing generator. The telephone had the convenience of a combined mouthpiece (transmitter) and earpiece (receiver), an innovation first developed in 1884 by L.M. Ericsson of Sweden.

The standard models were much cheaper, but were still beyond the reach of most people. A telephone installation cost around £20 per year - the same as the average wage of a servant. The telephone remained a luxury item for only the wealthiest people for many years, until the prices began to drop.

Electrophone table (1905) : a shared experience

The electrophone was a clever way for people to listen to live opera, theatre and church services down a telephone line, long before broadcast radio had been introduced. Transmitters in the venues were routed through the Electrophone Exchange and on to subscribers, listening to the requested performance by means of headphones.

The Electrophone company also provided these listening posts for rental in public areas, which meant that customers didn't have to own a telephone at home to be able to enjoy the entertainment.

So this sort of table might also have been found in a gentlemen's club or salon. The multi-headset tables made it more enjoyable because you could listen and laugh at the same jokes, at the same time, with your friends, which was almost like being there yourself.

Four-Needle Telegraph (c1837) : a further step on the road to success

Although the five needle telegraph is generally regarded as the first functional electric telegraph, this device was used by Cooke and Wheatstone to prove the principle on which the five needle telegraph was to function. It was also used to show Robert Stephenson's London to Birmingham railway company the principles they would demonstrate with the first commercial telegraph presentation on 8th July 1837.

As soon as Cooke and Wheatstone launched their five needle telegraph system, the race was on to create better, quicker and more efficient systems. This period of frenetic activity was similar to the early days of personal computers before the IBM PC and Mac became the standard models.

The goal was to use fewer needles, and wires to reduce cost and increase efficiency. To achieve this, the five-needles were reduced first to two and eventually one. By 1848, 1000 miles (1600km) of railway were equipped with telegraph wires carrying messages and Greenwich Mean Time from London to over 200 towns and cities across the country.