Spicer's Toolbox

 

The Spicer toolbox

Image courtesy of Warwickshire Museum Service

 

Contents of the Spicer toolbox

Image courtesy of Warwickshire Museum Service

 

Shop sign, taken from the Peter Spicer & Son’s premises in Leamington Spa

Image courtesy of Warwickshire Museum Service

The Spicer family were successful and well-known Warwickshire taxidermists during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Warwickshire Museum collection includes many examples of their taxidermy, especially the work of Peter Spicer who took over from his father John, turning taxidermy into a real art form and supplying rich clients all over Europe. This once-popular industry is an important part of the Warwickshire Museum collections, and the history of taxidermy within popular culture.

A resurgence in taxidermy

Interestingly, taxidermy as an art form is undergoing something of a resurgence. Peter Spicer’s mounts are enormously popular among taxidermy connoisseurs, representing finely crafted representations of the original animals, set within detailed dioramas of their original habitat. Behind the Spicer showrooms and catalogues, there was a lot of hard work, involving skilled workers prepared to work amongst animal carcasses and a range of chemicals in noisy workshops. There are records of bones and antlers piled high in the yards – a by-product of the industry.

The Spicer toolbox

Peter Spicer set up his workshop in Victoria Terrace, Leamington Spa in the early 1870s and his reputation for high-quality work soon grew. By the early 1900s Peter was joined in his work by sons Gilbert and William, and the business became Spicer & Sons. We have in our collection a toolbox, used at Peter Spicer’s workshop. Its contents include several cast iron stamps used to mark crates and display cases, measuring tools including callipers, pliers, and a coarse metal comb, presumably for cleaning and preparing mammal fur. We also have a shop sign, taken from the Peter Spicer & Son’s premises in Leamington Spa, presumably after the First World War when Peter retired, and the business was transferred to his sons.

Here at the museum, we’re very proud of our collection of Spicer taxidermy, one of the finest in existence and very popular with the new generation of enthusiasts. Equally though, our rather humble collection of tools provides a glimpse of hidden histories, material evidence for the hard work ‘behind the scenes’.