Mark and Ita go to Europe 2014: Monday in Cambridge

It's a sunny day on Monday! On this day, Clare College has moved Mark’s class to the Latimer Room to make way for the Amgen conference and the Biological Sciences conference also scheduled on the campus – we like the Latimer room a lot!

After class on Monday, Mark, Maggie and I visited the Wren Library, completed in 1695, on the Trinity College campus. We could take photos outside but cameras were forbidden inside -- the inside of the library was a fantastic long stretch of very old books set inside old ornate wooden bookcases with long wooden ladders to help pull down books at the top and all well lighted by huge windows along both sides. The entire design of the library was the brainchild of Christopher Wren, who also designed the bookshelves and furniture. There were busts of famous Trinity College graduates, such as Isaac Newton, Tennyson, Richard Bentley, J.J. Thomson, and Edward Coke. There were also large display cases featuring the 100th anniversary of WWI with photos and stories of their Trinity College graduates who went to war at that time. There was also a display case that featured a first edition of Newton's "Principia Mathematica" with his handwritten editorial changes. Also, we saw the handwritten draft of A.A. Milne's "Winnie the Pooh" (Milne, Christopher Robin Milne and Tim Milne, A.A.'s nephew, were all graduates of Trinity) along with a first edition of this same book.

I found this photo posted online - you can see the bookcases, windows, and busts!
In between the bookcases are more books with desks piled high with paper and books -
this is an actively used library which is why they probably didn't want us photographing and
bothering the researchers working in there.

Directly outside of the library is this large quad expanse relating to Trinity College

During the WWI & WWII, this part of the covered area
was used as a makeshift hospital for the wounded soldiers

Looking towards the entrance of the Wren Library

A close up of the far building at the end of the Library quad area.

Finally on Monday, Mark wanted to walk up the 142 steps to the top of Great St. Mary’s Cathedral. 142 VERY NARROW steps, all in a very tight circle all the way up – but the view was worth it! This church has stood on this spot since Saxon times. After 1209 when the University of Cambridge was established, the church was used for ceremonies, lectures and sermons.