How the Great Exhibition of 1851 still influences science today

Six million people visited the Crystal Palace to see cutting-edge science and technology. The vast profits generated continue to pay for innovations today

More than three million people visit the Science Museum every year, and the site is UK's most popular destination dedicated to science, technology, engineering. Yet this figure seems almost modest when considering the six million visitors who attended the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park between May and October of 1851 - equivalent to a third of the population of Britain at the time.

Visitors to the Crystal Palace, a marvel in its own right, were treated to demonstrations of cutting-edge technology of the day, including electric telegraphs, microscopes, a prototype facsimile machine, a revolving lighthouse light and an early submarine. This was the first, and perhaps the only time that such a large scale effort was made to promote technology to the masses. The event, masterminded by Prince Albert, made a profit of 186,000 (equivalent to tens of millions today).