Peace and Penicillin

At last the weather is warm.  It necessitates a quick change of clothes before leaving, for which I am grateful later.  (I've not had much use out of my cotton trousers this summer except in NYC, but the jeans are duly discarded)   It's warm and muggy as Phyllis 2 and I whizz down hill for the early train. 

First stop is the Fleming Museum inside St Mary's Hospital right next to Praed St.  Why have I been coming to Paddington all these years and never popped into this little gem?  It's low tech but all you need, with a display, film from the past and a talk from a human in the actual lab where Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928, which is shown below. Fleming's own son slept in this room when it became a medical students residence years later.  Now it's been reconstructed as a private museum.  Fleming got to medical school thanks to a legacy.  Then, as now, it was difficult to get in if you were poor.  I am grateful to be a baby boomer and go though University on a full grant.  It was as it should be and nowadays we have regressed.   

Read about the museum here  and all about Fleming here and his discovery here.  These links will also tell you about the Florey group in Oxford and the two decade story leading to the successful use of penicillin.  And don't forget the Sheffield story

Next I have a coffee by the Italian Gardens in Hyde Park.  It's too busy and my filling falls out.  Tra la la.   

Quick call to the dentist and then I jump on the Central Line at Lancaster Gate and head for Holborn

I'm going to Lincoln's Inn Fields

Here the old 

mingles with the new

This is the London School of Economics where I am visiting the Women's Library

I am researching their archives on the Greenham Common Peace Camp for more information for our new visitor centre at Greenham Control Tower

It's a great resource in pleasant surroundings with lovely staff.  After two boxes I take a break for carrot cake at Fields

Unlike the rest of my day this is mediocre, but a nice setting

 

On the way back to the tube I spot big tomatoes on the vine which TT is craving and buy them as well as some raspberries

Back to Paddington then home to feta salad and raspberries