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These advertisements invite the 18th-century person of curiosity to view the macabre collection of anatomical models exhibited by Benjamin Rackstrow at 197 Fleet Street. After Rackstrow’s death in 1772, the museum continued under new management until 1798, when it closed and much of the collection was put up for sale by curiosities dealer R. Heslop. The podcast gives you a tour of the whole museum as it would have been in 1791.

Both pictures courtesy of Wellcome Images.

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B. RACKSTROW, Statuary, in Fleet-Street
HAS completed a new Machine, being as big again as any hitherto made use of, with a compleat Apparatus, to exhibit at his House, for One Shilling each, the surprising Electrical Experiments made in Germany, France and Holland, with explanatory Observations on the Power, Activity, Light, and actual Fire of Electricity, the Person electrified firing Spirits, and all inflammatory Fluids, by the Approach of his Finger, let the Weather be how it will, its attractive and repulsive Force exciting instantaneous and almost incredible Sensations on any Number of Persons at once. He has found out some new Experiments relative to the Planetary System and the Sun’s illuminating the Earth, and will acknowledge himself very much oblig’d to whoever communicates any thing new.
And at the same Place is,
The FIGURE of ANATOMY, contriv’d by Mr ABRAHAM CHOVET, Surgeon, which represents a Woman eight Months gone with Child; wherein the Circulation of the Blood is made visible through Glass Veins and Arteries, by a red Liquor, in Imitation of Blood, being convey’d through them; At the same Time the Action of the Heart and Lungs, as also the Course of the Blood from the Mother to the Child, and from the Child to the Mother, is to be seen; by which Means any Person, though unskill’d in the Knowledge of Anatomy, may, at one View, be acquainted with the Circulation of the Blood, and in what Manner it is perform’d in our living Bodies.
Note, Due Attendance to shew the Figure, and other curious Anatomical Preparations. A proper Person to attend the Ladies.
[Price One Shilling]

London Daily Post 3 Jan 1747

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The most amazing, delightful, and instructive FIGURE which represents a Woman eight Months gone with Child, open’d when alive to shew the Foetus, and how it is nourish’d while in the Womb, and likewise the Circulation of the Blood by a red Liquor, being convey’d through Glass Tubes, made in Imitation of the principal Veins and Arteries of the Human Body; the Heart, and its Auricles; also the Lungs are put in their true and proper Motions, the Heart as receiving the Blood by the Veins, forcing it through the Arteries to all Parts of the Body; the Lungs are also to be seen as in the Action of Inspiration and Respiration. This FIGURE is to be seen and explained, with a great many Preparations both of Art and Nature, equally as curious, at Mr Rackstrow’s, opposite Serjeants-Inn, Fleet-Street, at One Shilling each Person.
A proper person attends the Ladies.

The Daily Advertiser 3 Feb 1755

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RACKSTROW’S MUSEUM, No. 197 Fleet Street, an Anatomical Figure, representing a Woman with Child, in which the circulation of the blood is imitated by liquors resembling the arterial and venous blood flowing, through glass vessels, which exactly correspond with the natural blood vessels, also the action of the heart, and motion of the lungs as in breathing, and the manner the child is nourished in the Womb, the whole making a beautiful appearance; a real preparation of a boy, fourteen years of age, in which the blood vessels are seen branching to and from every part of the body; a Figure of a woman dissected for the muscles, &c., and coloured to nature; many figures from women who died undelivered, in preternatural cases ; Figures resembling life, of his late and present Majesty ; of the Giant and Dwarf, &c. a great variety of natural and artificial curiosities, the hide of the Rhinoceros, which appears as alive; the stupendous Skeleton of a Whale, &c. This Museum contains the most capital collection in this or any other kingdom, and cannot fail to give the greatest satisfaction to the curious.
The Whole to be seen for Two Shillings. A Gentlewoman attends the Ladies.—A descriptive Catalogue, giving a full explanation, may be had, price 1s.

The Morning Chronicle and Daily Advertiser, 5 July 1783

1771 drawing of the waxworks of John Coan, the Norfolk Dwarf, and Edward Bamford, the Staffordshire Giant, which were exhibited in Rackstrow's Museum

On seeing RACKSTROW’S MUSEUM,
No. 197, Fleet-street.
WHAT’s here unfolded to our view, how fine!
The might work of Providence divine;
Anatomy to us unlocks her store
Of wonders, such as ne’er were seen before;
Th’exquisite mechanism and frame of Man
Is here produc’d for all the world to scan;
See, as in life, the blood its course pursue
Sublimely great, and wonderful to view!
The Student, here, may learn the art to save
The pregnant female from an untimely grave;
Physicians, Surgeons, may their art improve
Since Genius, here, will Error’s mist remove;
The Artist imitate what’s here displac’d
With accuracy, taste, and truth array’d;
Here birds and birds [sic] and beasts most beautiful and rare,
With fishes scarce, and reptiles too appear;
But if to please you, lesser objects fail,
Behold that prodigy of the world—a Whale!
And, to conclude in the Shakespearian strain,
“We ne’er shall look upon the like again.”

The St. James’s Chronicle, 7 June 1789

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RACKSTROW’S MUSEUM, No. 197, Between Temple Bar, and Chancery-lane, Fleet-street,
CONSISTING of most curious Objects, no where else to be seen; is an assemblage of wonders, in which the works of Art and Nature seem to vie with each other. Here the most elegant, ingenious, and accurate display of the Human Frame, in its unfolded state, with the most rare Natural Productions the World can afford, are exhibited for the Student to contemplate, the Curious to entertain, and the Virtuoso to admire. The View of the Anatomical Figures is solemn, delightful, interesting and instructive, impressing the beholders with ideas of the Omnipotence of the Creator, and condition of their own existence, inducing them frequently to exclaim, “fearfully and wonderfully are we made.” The Grave and Contemplative could dwell with them, even the most delicate of the Fair Sex daily crowd to see them. Though it is difficult to particularize, yet the Figure in which the circulation of the Blood is imitated (by liquors flowing through Glass Vessels) with the action of the Heart, and motion of the Lungs, that of the Muscles, those of pregnant Women, the real preparations, the skeleton of a Whale, the Rhinoceros, and the Egyptian Mummy, are very highly esteemed by the Public.
The whole to be seen for 2s. 6d.
Open from Eight o’Clock in the Morning, till Nine in the Evening.
A Gentlewoman attends the Ladies separately.
*** Please to take particular notice, that the House is not in front, but a passage with an iron Hatch at the entrance leads up to it.

The World, 24 December 1791