University of Iowa historian Elizabeth Yale (she’s a fellow at the Center for the Book) has a nice piece about Down House, Charles Darwin’s home for forty years, in Quartz:

In 1842, Charles Darwin and his wife Emma moved their young family to Down (now Downe), a village about 15 miles south of central London. They were seeking a country retreat, a place to raise their children away from the city, where the air was filled with coal smoke and the streets with sewage. But Charles also sought a sanctuary for his scientific work: a place far off enough from London to deter casual visitors.

She asks,

what revelations can the scientific pilgrim draw from it? What exemplary lessons does the life of St. Charles teach?

With the Darwins growing to a family of nine by 1850, Down House was a busy place. The displays in Down House, cluttered with the Darwin children’s toys, remind the visitor that this groundbreaking naturalist conducted his scientific labors in the midst of a rambunctious family life….

Of course, I have my own ideas about the exemplary lessons that Darwin’s life offers.

I’m going to England in a few weeks myself, and hope to make the pilgrimage to Down House, which still is not easy to get to.