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Reposted by Jack Gann

Vanessa is the name of the Doctor! @hpsvanessa.bsky.social · 2d

*peers through two holes cut in a newspaper*
www.spymuseum.org/about/career...

Job Opportunity: The International Spy Museum is searching for a Historian & Curator to join our Exhibitions and Collections team. Our new museum is located at L’Enfant Plaza.

www.spymuseum.org

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 2d

The museum's lecture series, Insights, is back from this Saturday.

To tie in with our POO! exhibition, the first lectures come from Dr Piers Mitchell from Cambridge's Ancient Parasites Laboratory and gut microbiome scientist Dr Jane Freeman.

Tickets here:
thackraymuseum.co.uk/event/thackr...

An image of microscopic gut bacteria in shades of purple. It has the title "Insights 2025/2026" over the image.

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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 4d

I knew they’d come for the archivists and librarians but honestly I assumed it would be for a reason better than “Our Special Boy wants to give his friend a sword! Give him a sword!”

Jess Piper @piperformissouri.bsky.social · 5d

“They asked for a sword, and we said, ‘Well, we do have swords, but we can’t give them away because they’re museum artifacts,’” said Todd Arrington, forced to resign as head of Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library.”

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 8d

Being stuck at home with covid makes me wonder how long until the museum puts on its inevitable covid exhibition.

How soon is too soon? At what point does it become a valuable and important thing to look back on and memorialise?

A photo of the lights hanging over the staircase at Thackray Museum of Medicine. A set of spiky balls resembling the COVID-19 viruses, each in a different rainbow colour, it is the museum's covid memorial.

A photo of a pop-up museum display from 2021, showing the Thackray Museum's contemporary collecting around COVID-19. The display includes homemade scrubs and posters and signs.

A photo of a vial of COVID-19 vaccine on display at Thackray Museum of Medicine. It is the Novavax version, taken from trials conducted at the museum.

A photo of a street in Leeds, taken during the COVID-19 pandemic. The streets are unusually quiet and empty. A public information sign gives information on social distancing and hand sanitiser, saying: "Welcome to Leeds city centre. Your safety is our main priority."

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 13d

Just booked my covid vaccine for two weeks time, then this happens.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 13d

Come and see me talking blood, politics, capitalism, and disease at @otleyscience.bsky.social on November 14th. What a fun afternoon (Mike Berners-Lee is on in the evening, you could make a depressing day of it).

otleycourthouse.org.uk/events/otley...

A museum display featuring three objects: a vial of blood clotting factor from the 1970s, blood sample test tubes with HIV biohazard labels, and a red, yellow and black memorial ribbon from the campaign group Tainted Blood.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 13d

9 pairs of testicles and a pair of ovaries. All the leeches could just breed with any other. (No leech babies at the museum yet)

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 14d

Any opportunity to talk about how chemical warfare cured my cancer!

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · 14d

We get asked about this often enough that I added it as a bonus answer in our "answering kids' questions about poo" exhibition.

A white and blue ceramic apothecary jar from the 1700s with a painted label saying "Torment", like a delftware Pandora's Box.

Next to the jar, a museum label asks "What's in a jar of torment?" and answers "Torment means pain and suffering, but this medicine does the opposite. The roots of tormentil, a yellow flower related to a rose, have long been a natural cure for the torment of diarrhoea."

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Sep 7

"Kind and witty"

www.salisburyjournal.co.uk/news/2536769...

Tributes paid to ‘exceptionally generous’ councillor and digital health pioneer

Tributes have been paid to “kind and thoughtful” Salisbury councillor and digital healthcare pioneer Bob Gann, who died last Thursday aged 72

www.salisburyjournal.co.uk

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Sep 3

Something I really appreciate in all the professional tributes to Dad is the emphasis on his kindness and generosity as much as the big stuff he did. Good to be reminded of the value of being a kind person.

Patient Information Forum @pifonline.bsky.social · Aug 28

This week we are paying tribute to our friend and colleague Bob Gann.

Bob was a tireless campaigner for health literacy and digital inclusion. He had a hugely successful career but was always willing to share his knowledge and expertise.

He will be greatly missed.
pifonline.org.uk/news/bob-gan...

pifonline.org.uk

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Reposted by Jack Gann

Bob Gann @bobgann.bsky.social · Aug 16

Bob’s funeral will be held at 12 on September 2nd at Salisbury Arts Centre. Tea and Coffee from 11.30.

Wear whatever you like.

No flowers, donations to the Samaritans via the funeral director ([email protected]).

All welcome to our home for refreshments after the funeral.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Aug 5

I'm going to take some time out. This has left me shocked and at a loss.

Bob Gann @bobgann.bsky.social · Aug 2

Bob’s sons Tom, Jack and Joey here. We’re really sad to let you know that Bob died suddenly on Thursday. The funeral will be in about 3 weeks – we’ll share further details here when we can. If you want to get in touch, you can email Jane, our mum, at jcgannuk[at]yahoo.co.uk

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 30

Sign of the times, though, that children born in the pandemic have dolls whose accessories are face masks.

The Chelsea doll being played with by small hands. She is wearing a purple face mask.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 30

"El Alma de Madrid" is just as Yorkshire as train beer. Both brewed in the York area, just beside the LNER line.

Reposted by Jack Gann

Brian Groom @groomb.bsky.social · Jul 30

Love story of two Edwardian servants on Yorkshire estate told in new collection. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Love story of two Edwardian servants on Yorkshire estate told in new collection

Grandson of valet Alf Edwards and kitchen maid Caroline Palmer donates dozens of their personal objects to English Heritage

www.theguardian.com

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 30

Have reached the point where a train trip requires bringing not just a choice of entertainment for real world 5 year old, but also for Chelsea.

A doll of Barbie's kid sister Chelsea, sat on the table of an LNER train. She has headphones on and a tablet, along with a backback and a teddy.

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Reposted by Jack Gann

Cat Irving @anatomicalcat.bsky.social · Jul 28

A large anatomical ‘fugitive leaf’ from Cassell’s People’s Physician, Vol. 5, published in the 1930s. These kind of anatomical illustrations with fold out sections functioned as paper dissections, and were intended to help non-medical audiences learn about anatomy.

An illustration of the dissected female body with sections folding to right and left to show other aspects of dissection, and portions of the anatomy that lift up to show the structures underneath

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 27

When that cinema opened, L Frank Baum was still producing his own silent short Oz films with his own studio. This might not even be the first Oz movie it showed.

Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 27

I'm on LeedsTV on an occasional rotation all weekend discussing an "orb of poo". You can also see the piece here

www.facebook.com/YEP.newspape...

2.2K views | Designed for children, this new exhibition at the Thackray Museum transforms toilet talk into science fun | Yorkshire Evening Post

Designed for children, this new exhibition at the Thackray Museum transforms toilet talk into science fun.

www.facebook.com

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Alison Atkin @alisonatkin.bsky.social · Jul 27

increasingly want to see an exhibition that is just "lil' guys from history"

Six is a one pound monster. @thesix.bsky.social · Jul 26

We have always made delightful little guys.

Tumblr normal-horoscopes
Everyone shut up and look at this carving of a whale from the 1200-600 CE
Chumash culture

The whale looks delightfully round and seems to be smiling.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 26

It was the way people keep yelling "I'm gonna gut you like a fish" while you're just out for a nice stroll that particularly stood out.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 26

New exhibition opens today.

It's about poo. And answering children's questions.

It's both silly and informative. And can be enjoyed throughout the summer and up to the end of the year.

💩

thackraymuseum.co.uk/event/poo/

A paper towel dispenser typically seen in public toilets. It is labelled "Take a Sheet" and dispenses fun worksheets for museum visitors

A museum display with a poster and objects in a glass case. A text panel reads "Peek-a-Poo". The case is made up of round peep holes through which different shapes of plasticine poo are displayed on perspex blocks. They are the different shapes of the Bristol Stool Chart, made and described by local school kids.

A Bristol Stool Chart type 4 is captioned "A smooth, slippery pickle. Looks like a hotdog or a baby's arm".

Twenty toilet seats mounted on a wall. They have questions on the lid ranging from "when?" and "why?" to "can poo be used for medicine?"

A fossilised faeces from the Middle Ages, sitting in a clear petri dish on a perspex block. Colourful neon lights reflect off the surface of the block.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 24

Thackray has, somewhat unfairly, a reputation for being a museum of "weird shit".

I would counter that this is actually a very ordinary shit. Having it spotlit in the middle of a gallery is a little idiosyncratic, I'll admit.

A shiny translucent orb sits on a wooden plinth. Inside is a - frankly enormous - human turd.

In the background there are colourful test tubes and signs, part of a museum exhibition dressed to look like a fun laboratory.

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Jack Gann @jackgann.bsky.social · Jul 22

Front page of the @museumsassociation.org Museums Journal website is all job losses, repatriation issues, concerns about Israel... and me saying "we made a lot of plasticine poo"!

www.museumsassociation.org/museums-jour...

Q&A | “We made a lot of plasticine poo” - Museums Association

The Thackray Museum’s Jack Gann lifts the lid on its new child-led exhibition

www.museumsassociation.org

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