Relics, replicas and commemorationsSoraya de Chadarevian

Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, Free School Lane, Cambridge, CB2 3RH, UK

Several replicas of Watson and Crick’s demonstration

model of DNA built at the Cavendish Laboratory in

Cambridge in 1953 exist, but where is the original?

Once the object of intense discussion but soon super-

seded by more refined models built at King’s College

London, it slowly fell to pieces and was eventually dis-

assembled. Twenty years after it was first constructed,

some of its pieces resurfaced at Bristol. By that time,

the value attached to the original incarnation of the

double helix had changed substantially, and the Science

Museum in London commissioned a replica of the

model, with some of the original parts built into it. The

model was hailed as ‘the nearest there is to the original’.

It has since served as prototype for further replicas.

Meanwhile the spidery model of DNA has become the

ultimate icon of 20th-century life sciences, and more

pieces supposedly belonging to the original continue

to appear at auction.

In 1971, Arthur Arnone, one of many young Americanresearchers spending a three-year postdoctoral stint at the

world-famous Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratoryof Molecular Biology (LMB) in Cambridge, detected a fewmetal plates among other jigs on a dusty bench in themodel-building room [1]. Arnone picked up what herecognized as an adenine base, one of the four basespresent in nucleic acids. In that moment, Francis Crickwalked by the door. Cheerfully he confirmed that hethought it was one of the bases he and James Watson hadused to build their DNA model in 1953, almost 20 yearsearlier when the laboratory was still housed in thephysics department. Arnone got him to sign the basewith an ink marker. When Watson visited thelaboratory a year later, he managed to make him addhis signature on the back.

Arnone has remained the fond ‘custodian’ of the originalbase for over 30 years. Once a year, when he gave hislectures on DNA structure at the University of Iowa, hewould bring the base along for the students to see, but nottouch. Invariably he earned their spontaneous applause.He has now returned the base to the Cambridge laboratoryfor the 50th anniversary of the double helix (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Base plate (with central hole) collected by Arthur Arnone in Cambridge in 1971 and signed by Francis Crick and (on the other side) by James Watson. The function of

the red color mark is unknown. The plate is currently on display in the exhibition Representations of the Double Helix at the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in

Cambridge. Photograph by Leslie McKeany. Courtesy of the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge.

Corresponding author: Soraya de Chadarevian (sd10016@cam.ac.uk).

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If, in this anniversary year, we want to pay a visit to thecelebrated structure, a good bet is the Science Museum inLondon, which boasts not one, but two DNA models withmetal plates and spidery backbone that are, on first sight,almost indistinguishable from each other. Yet anothermodel has recently been built in the workshop of the LMBin Cambridge for display in the Whipple Museum of theHistory of Science. However, Watson and Crick’s ‘original’model no longer exists, and Arnone’s base plate is only oneof a confusing number of such plates held in private handor by museums.

Despite the importance attributed to the model in theaccounts of Watson and Crick’s discovery of the DNAdouble helix, little is known about its actual fate. This is allthe more surprising given the value attached to physicalartefacts of the event. Tracing the busy career of Watsonand Crick’s model provides unique insights into themaking of a 20th-century icon.

A model six-feet tall

What then happened to the model Watson and Crick builtin 1953? First, we need to clarify which model we speak of.Model building was Watson and Crick’s main approach intheir attempt to interpret available data, much of itproduced by Rosalind Franklin and her research studentRaymond Gosling at King’s College London, and thus todeduce the three-dimensional structure of DNA. Caltechscientist Linus Pauling’s success in determining thestructure of the polypeptide chain in proteins throughmodel building had convinced the two researchers of thepower of the method. Watson and Crick built many modelsthat were quickly dismantled because the suggestedstructures did not lead to any satisfactory solution. Fortheir various attempts they used the brass skeletal modelbuilding parts that were in the Cambridge laboratory forprotein modeling. Whilst playing with cardboard models ofthe bases, drawn according to Jerry Donohue’s suggestionof the prevalent forms in which the bases occurred in thecell, Watson fell upon the mechanism of base pairing – theactual novel feature of their structure. The schematic 2D(rather than 3D) representation of the bases certainlyfacilitated Watson’s work, just as the paper model of thepolypeptide chain had helped Pauling, although this is apoint often lost in anecdotal details. Watson had orderedmetal cut-outs of the bases from the Cavendish workshop[2]. These took several days to produce. Getting impatient,he and Crick started building models with the usualskeletal building parts for the backbone and just aconstraint for the bases, at this point confidently placedat the inside of the two helical chains. Probably severalsuch models were built, although no photographic or otherrecord of these working structures survives [3]. Thismeans that the model we know from the famous picture,taken in May 1953 by Cambridge freelance photographerAntony Barrington Brown, was not Watson and Crick’sactual working model but a later model, built fordemonstration [4]. Indeed, when a photograph of themodel first appeared in print in Watson’s best-selling TheDouble Helix, the caption read: ‘the original demonstrationmodel of the double helix’ [5] (Fig. 2).

This photograph, probably taken at a Cavendish open

day in July 1953, and Barrington Brown’s photograph –originally taken to accompany a report on Watson andCrick’s discovery in Time magazine (but not published atthe time) – are, to my knowledge, the only extant picturesof the model. None of them appeared in the scientificpublications on the structure. Rather, Watson and Crick’sfirst publication in Nature, drafted before the demon-stration model was completed, included only a diagram-matic sketch of the structure, drawn by Crick’s wife Odile,whilst a later paper giving a fuller description of thestructure featured photographs of a rough scale modelbuilt in the Cavendish workshop for use in the lectureroom [6–8]. Nevertheless, the two casual photographsplayed a pivotal role in the subsequent history of themodel.

There was no press conference following Watson andCrick’s conclusion of their work on the structure. This wasnot part of British academic culture at the time [9]. Inaddition, the proposed structure was not more than ahypothetical model and still awaited to be tested againstmore accurate experimental data. The six-feet tall modelstanding in Watson and Crick’s office in the Cavendishnonetheless served to convince fellow scientists andimpress foundation officers. Visitors came to see themodel ‘in the flesh’.

Fig. 2. The ‘original demonstration model of the double helix’ (probably July

1953). Photographer unknown. Courtesy of the James D. Watson Collection, Cold

Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

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Yet the fragile construction was not built to last. In oneof Barrington Brown’s discarded photographs, we seeCrick repairing the structure when it was not more than afew weeks old. Soon, it also emerged that the structure wasnot correct in all detail. Pauling for one showed that thetwo bases guanine and cytosine were held together bythree rather than by two hydrogen bridges as had beensuggested by Watson and Crick. The bases were alsomoved too far from the central axis of the structure. Moreprecise measurements of various parameters soon led tothe construction of more accurate models at King’s CollegeLondon [10]. Watson and Crick’s model neverthelesssurvived in the Cavendish until the early 1960s, whenthe group moved to the newly built LMB on the outskirts ofCambridge. In the autumn of 1962, the same year as themove, Watson and Crick, together with Maurice Wilkins,were awarded the Nobel Prize for their work on thestructure of DNA.

In the new laboratory, the model found a place in thecommunal model room, but soon became neglected. Moreand more pieces broke away. Nobody seemed to bothermuch. Eventually, the dilapidated model was dismantledand as was usual practice, its parts were mixed up withother modeling material to be used for new model buildingprojects.

From Bristol to London

Arnone may well have been the first to turn a remnantfrom Watson and Crick’s model into a relic, a historicalitem worth collecting. The autographed piece also servedas a memento or souvenir of his time at the prestigiousLMB, where he crossed paths with Crick, Watson andothers who had become leading figures in the field.

Nonetheless, Arnone was lucky to come across someforgotten plates in a dusty corner of the model room.Shortly before he came to the laboratory, several metalplates had been packed up – apparently inadvertently so –with other model-building material for protein crystal-lographer Herman Watson when he moved fromCambridge to take up a position in Bristol. It wascustomary for scientists to take their model materialwith them when moving. Packing was done by techniciansin the laboratory. As a token, the parting scientist left acontribution to the tea fund.

In the mid-1970s, Ann Newmark, research assistant ofthe chemical collection at the Science Museum in London,travelled to Bristol to discuss with Herman Watson thereconstruction of the ‘forest of rods’ model of myoglobin, animpressive structure, pieces of which she had discovered inthe museum store. It had been the first ever atomic modelof a protein, built by John Kendrew at the LMB. HermanWatson had been involved in the later stages of the workand was the nearest at hand to help. At Bristol, Newmarkdiscovered the flat metal plates, some of which werereconstructed in a makeshift DNA model for the students.Watson agreed to let the Science Museum have the originalpieces if replacement plates were provided. Newmark gotthe Science Museum workshops to cut some metal platesand duly received the set of original plates from Bristol,except for a single plate that remained incorporated in theBristol model [11]. It appears that the set acquired by the

Museum consisted of eight base pairs (i.e. sixteen bases)[12].

Farooq Hussain, a research student at King’s CollegeLondon, was engaged in reconstructing the three-strandedmodel of DNA that Pauling had proposed shortly beforeWatson and Crick published their double-stranded one.Hussain’s aim was to photograph the model for inclusion ina biography of Pauling he was writing. He was equallykeen to try his hand at the Watson and Crick model andhappily agreed to build a facsimile for the Science Museumusing the plates acquired from Bristol. Crick offered tohelp as much as he could, although according to Hussain‘his memory seems to be a bit vague as to exactly what themodel looked like’ [13]. A photograph of the original model– probably one or the other of those mentioned above –offered useful guidance.

The replica was completed in time for the opening of therefurbished chemistry gallery in March 1977 (Fig. 3), andhas been on show in the Science Museum ever since. In themid-1980s, it became part of the Living Moleculesexhibition celebrating 40 years of molecular biologyresearch in Britain. From there, it was moved to theHealth Matters gallery in the museum, and more recentlyto the Making the Modern World gallery. In its newlocation, the model is dwarfed by a Lockhead Airlinerhanging over it and other big artefacts of the erasurrounding it, among them a V2 rocket, a Rolls-RoyceMerlin Engine, and a vertical tower of 1950s automobiles.

Fig. 3. Replica of Watson and Crick’s 1953 model of DNA with some original base

plates built by Farooq Hussain from King’s College London in 1977. The model is

on display in the Making the Modern World gallery at the Science Museum,

London. Source: Science Museum/Science & Society Picture Library. Slide no.

SCM/BIO/C1000271.

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The original label faithfully stated: ‘the nearest there is tothe original model.’ More recently this caution has beenbrushed aside and the model is now simply presented as‘Crick and Watson’s DNA model 1953’. Only when readingthe small print will the visitor understand that this is areplica with some original base plates. The model hasserved as prototype for further replicas produced in themuseum. The first one of these, adjusted in height to whatretrospectively seemed the more correct size, is also ondisplay. A more recent one was built to order and sold toJapan. The first replica has meanwhile undergonerestoration, sealing its status as a museum object.

Memories and re-enactments

What had triggered the transition of the base plates – theonly distinguishable parts of Watson and Crick’s modelbecause they had been purpose-built – from neglectedlaboratory items to collectibles some 20 years after theiroriginal use? And what, besides the chance discovery of thebase plates in Bristol, motivated the Science Museum toinvest resources in rebuilding Watson and Crick’s 1953model? On one level of course, it is often only time thatchanges the value of objects. Only once their use is notobvious anymore or their existence threatened, do thingsseem worth preserving. However, in the case of the doublehelix, more was at stake.

From the late 1960s, scientists started to celebrateWatson and Crick’s determination of the double-helicalstructure of DNA as the ‘origin’ of a new science of lifebased on a molecular understanding of genes and theirfunctions. This origin account of the new science was hotlycontested, but the development of recombinant DNAtechnologies in the mid-1970s heightened the interest inDNA and gave the origin account new leverage. Even moreimportant for the public perception was Watson’s book TheDouble Helix, which came onto the market in 1968 [14].This brash account of the ‘race’ to discover the structure ofthe genetic material was as much criticized as it becamesuccessful. The book did not only establish the dramaticstory of the discovery, but also introduced the talldemonstration model of DNA as a central figure alongsideWatson and Crick, the other two heroes of the story. Thetwo photographs of the model, published here for the firsttime, underlined this fact. Confirming its hero status, the21st birthday of the structure was widely celebrated in1974. Initiatives included a special issue of Nature with acartoon on the cover showing Watson and Crick slidingdown a helix, and a BBC Horizon program, Race for theDouble Helix, featuring many of the protagonists [15].

These events seem to explain the new interest in thedouble helix and its story even beyond strictly scientificcircles. And yet, the value attached to relics of the originalmodel and especially the full-scale reconstruction of themodel invites further consideration.

It has been argued that tangible relics, once identifiedas such, make history more accessible and lend immediacyto past events. Re-creations of historical artefact canproduce the same effect [16]. In the case of science, relics,often connected to great men, facilitate the engagement ofthe wider public and thus, frequently fulfil a centralfunction in commemorations and public displays [17–19].

They also play a key role in constructing stories aboutscience and humankind [20].

Relics and replicas of the double helix fulfil similarfunctions. They are not just tokens of great deeds, butactively contribute to the creation and public celebration ofthose deeds. The collective gasp that Arnone could elicitfrom his students when showing the original base plateafter the right introduction is testimony to the closeengagement relics can produce. Similarly, the replicasbuilt of the original model all served to engage a widerpublic. Besides the display of the semi-original model inthe Science Museum, the most glamorous role was playedby a replica of the 1953 model built by technicians in theLMB for Life Story, the 1987 BBC adaptation of Watson’sbook. The film, repeatedly shown on television, ended withthe model ascending towards the sky accompanied bytriumphant music. The supernatural connotations werenot coincidental. The glamour of the double helix, theprotagonists suggested, lies not in the worldly story of itsdiscovery, but in the basic mechanism of reproduction itrepresents; the model is the ‘secret of life’ made visible [21].

With the growing value attached to Watson and Crick’swork on the structure of DNA, it is little surprise that baseplates started to appear at auctions, not unlike the trade ofreligious relics in earlier centuries, and consequently,disputes have arisen over how to distinguish ‘original’plates from later replicas [22,23]. The Science Museumalone counts 38 ‘original’ base plates in its holdings, nearlytwice the set of 20 plates that were present in the 1953demonstration model. The two researchers themselvesmight well have ordered more than just those 20 baseplates at the time, although no order form to the workshopsurvives, and probably never existed. More may have beenproduced later. Those made for the BBC production alsodisappeared one by one, once the model had returned fromfilming. Notes made by staff at the Science Museum in the1970s indicate that ‘those [plates] with holes were used inthe original double helix model of DNA’ [24]. Several of thebase plates held at the Science Museum as well as Arnone’s

Fig. 4. Base plates (without hole) supposedly collected in the early 1960s in Cam-

bridge and belonging to the original set. (b) Replica of Watson and Crick’s DNA

model, built at the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology in

Cambridge. These are currently on display in the exhibition Representations of the

Double Helix at the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in Cambridge.

Courtesy of the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cam-

bridge.

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plate do indeed have a central hole, but others with equallyconvincing pedigrees have not [25] (Fig. 4a). Crick does notremember if the original plates had holes, but Watson isadamant that ‘there were no holes in the flat tin bases usedin the original model’ [26]. Although holes could have actedto hold a stack of tin plates in place during cutting in theworkshop [27], and marks of a screw which would havebeen used in this process are indeed visible on some of theplates (Fig. 1), the holes do not seem to have had anyfunction in model building itself.

The verdict on the question of the holes and theauthenticity of the base plates remains open. Yet, tomake sure that the latest replica with its shiny base platesbuilt for the 50th anniversary does not suffer the same fateas its predecessors, the technicians at the LMB havescrewed the structure to a perspex case designed to protectit [28] (Fig. 4b). Does this case as those surrounding thereplicas at the Science Museum spell the end of the model’shistory? The prominence of the celebrations for its 50thbirthday suggests not.

AcknowledgementsI thank Antony Broad, Arthur Arnone, Robert Bud, Francis Crick,Michael Fuller, Richard Henderson, Roger Lucke, Hilary Muirhead, AnnNewmark, Peter Pauling, Claudio Villa, Hilary Wallace and JamesWatson for their help in reconstructing the fate of the original model andits base plates.

References

1 The following description closely follows Arthur Arnone’s own accountof the events. See A. Arnone to R. Henderson, 23 October and 28October 2002

2 The suggestion to use ready-made plates for the bases apparently camefrom Antony Broad, the engineer in the laboratory. The aim was tomake Watson and Crick’s experimental models more stable

3 Letter by Francis Crick to author, 5 January 19984 On the history of the Barrington Brown photograph, see de

Chadarevian, S. (2003) Portrait of a discovery. Watson, Crick andthe double helix, Isis 94, 90–105

5 Watson, J.D. (1968) The Double Helix. A Personal Account of theDiscovery of the Structure of DNA, p. 121, Atheneum and Weidenfeldand Nicolson

6 Watson, J.D. and Crick, F.H.C. (1953) Molecular structure of nucleicacids, Nature, 171, 737–738

7 Crick, F.H.C. and Watson, J.D. (1954) The complementary structure ofdeoxyribonucleic acid, Proc. R. Soc. Lond A 223, 80–96

8 The much smaller model is currently on show in the exhibitionRepresentations of the Double Helix at the Whipple Museum of theHistory of Science, University of Cambridge

9 Of the press reports that followed in May and June that year, noneincluded a photograph of the model

10 Wilkins, M. (1964) The molecular configuration of nucleic acids. In LesPrix Nobel en 1962, pp. 126–154

11 Personal communication, Ann Newmark (Science Museum) andHilary Muirhead (Bristol)

12 Farooq Hussain to Ann Newmark, 5 October 1978; Science Museum,file 996/45

13 Farooq Hussain to Ann Newmark, 5 October 1996; Science Museum,file 996/45

14 Watson, J.D. (1968) The Double Helix. A Personal Account of the

Discovery of the Structure of DNA, Atheneum and Weidenfeld andNicolson

15 Special issue Nature 248 (1974), April 2616 Lowenthal, D. (1985) The Past is a Living Country, especially pp. 238–

249, Cambridge University Press17 Jordanova, L. (2000) Presidential address: remembrance of science

past, Brit. J. Hist. Sci. 33, 387–40618 Ward, L. (1994) The cult of relics: Pasteur material at the Science

Museum, Med. Hist. 38, 52–7219 On scientific commemorations more generally, see also Abir-Am, P.G.

and Elliott, C.A., eds (1999) Commemorative Practices in Science.Historical Perspectives on the Politics of Collective Memory, Osiris 14

20 Bud, R. (1995) Science, meaning and myth in the museum, PublicUnderstanding of Science 4, 1–6

21 In contrast to other historical reconstruction projects, then, it is thedisplay of the structure rather than the learning process involved inrebuilding the model that matters in this case

22 On the trade of religious relics, see Geary, P.A. (1978) Furta Sacra.Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages, Princeton University Press

23 On religious relics, see also Brown, P. (1981) The Cult of the Saints. ItsRise and Function in Latin Christianity, SCM Press

24 Registry, reference 2092/12/3; Science Museum London, file T/1977/310

25 The model built by Farooq Hussain for the Science Museumincorporates nine (of 20) base plates with holes. A few more werekept aside. It is not clear if all base plates acquired from Bristol had acentral hole

26 Crick to author, 9 January 2003 and Watson to author, 13 January2003

27 Antony Broad, personal communication28 The model departs in another telling aspect from the original one: the

number of hydrogen bonds between cytosine and guanine has beencorrected from two to three. The reasons given for this change weredidactical

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