History of University College London tribute. Bentham's body is on public display at UCL in a wooden cabinet, at the end of the South Cloisters of the UCL Main Building; he had directed in his will that he wanted his body to be preserved as a lasting memorial to the university. This 'Auto-Icon' has become famous. Unfortunately, when it came to his head, the preservation process went disastrously wrong and left it badly disfigured. A wax head was made to replace it; the actual head is now kept in the college vaults. In 1827, a year after the founding of UCL, construction of the Main
University College London with the Institute of Archaeology. In 1988, UCL merged with the Institute of Laryngology & Otology, the Institute of Orthopaedics, the Institute of Urology & Nephrology and Middlesex Hospital Medical School. In 1993, a reorganisation of the University of London meant that UCL and other colleges gained direct access to government funding and the right to confer University of London degrees themselves. This led to UCL being regarded as a "de facto" university in its own right. In 1994, the University College London Hospitals NHS Trust was established. UCL merged with the College of Speech Sciences and the Institute of