It was established by Robert Edmond Grant in 1828 as a teaching collection of zoological specimens and material for dissection. On his death Grant left his own collection to the museum. In 1875 Edwin Ray Lankester added to the museum collection. Later lecturer curators include W. Weldon (1860–1906), Edward Alfred Minchin, an embryologist named J. Hill and a palaeontologist named D. After 1948 the
museum was under the care of professional curators.The collection contains around 67,000 zoological specimens, many of which are very rare and several of which have been rediscovered only recently in storage. The collection contains specimens from a number of former university collections, including specimens from Imperial College London and Queen Mary University of London in addition to material from London Zoo and various London hospital comparative anatomy collections.In 2011, the museum moved from its previous location in the Darwin Building on the UCL campus to new quarters in the Thomas Lewis Room in the Rockefeller Building, formerly the UCL Medical School library.
