Jillian Cherry

Tower of London

It’s already our third week in London, but I still feel like I just got here.  We’ve been lucky to be able to do so many things, but personally, my favorite thing so far has been visiting the Tower of London.  I love learning about King Henry VIII and the Tudor dynasty, so the Tower of London is the perfect place for me to geek out.

So in case any of you want to know, King Henry VIII was married 6 times.  He started the Church of England so that he could divorce Catharine of Aragon and then marry Anne Boleyn, who was later executed at the Tower of London for allegedly committing adultery.  Soon after Boleyn’s death, he married his third wife Jane Seymour, who gave birth to his son King Edward VI, but she tragically died shortly after childbirth.  King Henry VIII loved Seymour more than any of his other wives, and she was the only wife to receive a queen’s funeral.  In fact, he was buried next to her after his death.  After Seymour’s death, King Henry waited three years to remarry to Anne of Cleaves. However, it didn’t last long.  He soon annulled their marriage so that he could marry his teenage mistress, Katherine Howard.  Soon after, Howard was also found guilty of adultery and was executed at the Tower of London. 

His sixth and final wife was Katherine Parr, and they reigned happily together until his death.  At his death, his nine-year-old son, Edward VI, was succeeded to the throne, but he died five years later.  In his will, he named Lady Jane Gray as his successor above his two half sisters, Mary I and Elizabeth I.  However, nine days after Lady Jane took the throne, she lost power to Mary I and was executed soon after.  Mary and Elizabeth had a tumultuous relationship throughout Mary’s reign.  Mary even imprisoned Elizabeth in the Tower of London at one point of particular strife. However, their relationship improved before Mary’s death, and at the end of Mary’s life, she named Elizabeth her successor.  Elizabeth I was the last of the Tudor dynasty as she never married and never produced any heirs.  Her reign has since been dubbed the Golden Age of England.

As you can see, the Tower of London offers a great historical background.  It has been a royal residence, a jail, a mint, and now it houses the famous crown jewels.  So if you are ever in London, I would highly recommend taking a guided tour, especially if you are a history buff like me.

It is pretty difficult to stay indoors long enough to sit through statistics with all of the exciting things to do in London; however, Dr. Mee does a really great job of keeping us interested.  This week we took a field trip to the headquarters of Dunnhumby, an innovator in the field of statistical analysis.  The work environment was like nothing I’ve ever seen before.  It was very open and cultivated an atmosphere of communication.  If I ever change my major to marketing or statistics, Dunnhumby is definitely a company that I would love to work for. 

We can all really tell that Dr. Mee is passionate about his profession, and he does a really great job of making statistics exciting.  Unfortunately, this is our last week of class with him, but we have BA 207 to look forward to with Dr. Morris.  Pretty soon we will be done with classes and headed to our internships.  Stay tuned for more updates from me when our internships start!