25 jaar Stichting Schepsel Schelp in Utrecht

Mr and Mrs Piet and Jeanette Hessel spent almost all of their life collecting marine shells – fossil as well as recent. Their collection may have been the largest private one in the Netherlands comprising approximately 63,000 samples including 15,000 species of recent marine molluscs. The highlight of the collection is a fossil Gisortia coombii from Aquitaine, France. For 25 years the collection was presented in the private museum ‘Schepsel Schelp’ (‘Creature Shell’) in Utrecht, but because of the Hessel's advanced age, parts of the collection have been transferred to national museums. However, their son Rudi Hessel will continue the collection in Rhenen with a focus on Miocene and older fossils. To document parts of their collection, Mr and Mrs Hessel’s foundation issued a two-volume book titled: ‘Stichting Schepsel Schelp, 1991 tot 2016’.