Artificial Gallery

John Grooms Crippleage and Flower Girls Mission

John Groom's Crippleage and Flower Girls Mission. Blind and Crippled Girls making artificial flowers. John Groom's vision for orphaned and disabled girls and women to find a way to support themselves has had a lasting legacy, with a network of care homes around the country. John Groom (1845-1919) (pictured centre) set up his first mission in 1866 at the age of 21 for girls and women who needed shelter, a regular meal and a way of earning some money. Date: 1907

© Mary Evans / Grenville Collins Postcard Collection

English Electric Canberra B.2 WV787

Aeroplane & Armament Experimental Establishment - English Electric Canberra B.2 WV787 (msn 71644), water-spray tanker for icing tests, at RAF Greenham Common on 27 June 1981 for the 1981 International Air Tattoo. The aircraft requiring the test flew behind WV787's water spray bar, seen at the extreme rear of the fuselage, as water was pumped out producing an artificial cloud. Built as a Canberra 8.2, WV787 was a good example of a development aircraft. Initially used as a test-bed for reheated Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire engines, the aircraft was later fitted with a Mk 8 front fuselage and Buccaneer nose radome for use as a radar test-bed. Relegated to Ground instructional use as 8799M, then preserved at Newark Air Museum, Nottinghamshire. Date: 1981

© The Peter Butt Aviation Collection / Mary Evans A The Peter Butt Aviation Collection / Mary Evans

Elkhorn plant, Rhombophyllum dolabriforme

Elkhorn plant, Rhombophyllum dolabriforme (Hatchet-leaved fig marigold, Mesembryanthemum dolabriforme). Mesembryanthemum a feuilles en forme de langue. Mesembryanthemum folio lingui formi longiere 1, Mesembryathemum folio lingui formi latiore 2. Handcoloured copperplate engraving by Jean Victor Dupin junior from Pierre Joseph Buchoz Herbier Artificial, representant plus de quinze cents plates, tant Europeennes qu'Exotiques, Gogue & Nee de La Rochelle, Paris, 1783

© Florilegius