There aren’t many rules at Nothing To See Here, but here’s one – if you’re ever near a camera obscura go and see it. Scotland is blessed with three, in Dumfries, Edinburgh and Kirriemuir. Edinburgh’s has the best views, Kirriemuir’s has a literary connection (gifted to the town by Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie) but Dumfries’s is the oldest of the three and in fact, the oldest working instrument of its type in the world.

Plans for the camera obscura started in 1834 when local businessman Robert Thomson heard that the old windmill at the top of Corbelly Hill was going to be demolished. With local support he purchased the building for £350 to create the Dumfries and Maxwellton Astronomical Society. The tower was converted into an observatory and the camera obscura was brought all the way from Kilmarnock on a horse and cart.

Initially, the tower was only open to members and selected ones at that. The writer Thomas Carlyle was one of the first to arrive. It was 1849 before members of the working class were allowed in and even then it was only on Saturdays. As donations from patrons grew, the adjoining museum began to grow as the observatory went slowly out of fashion. It stopped operating as an observatory in 1870s.

Providing the weather is amenable, its operation is fairly simple. An angled mirror on a long pole poking up at the top of the tower (like a periscope) projects images of the outside world onto large flat table below. That may not sound very exciting considering that you could look out of the window and see more or less the same thing but it feels magical, like floating invisibly around the world with an all-seeing eye. It’s fun to play God, picking up passing cars with a piece of paper or making an invisible bump in the road for buses to shuffle over.

With technological advancements, camera obscuras have no practical purpose, but that doesn’t diminish their appeal. It’s a chance to catch a little glimpse of the present through the eyes of the past. Dumfries is lucky to have this illuminating little gem.

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Posted by Anne on June 06, 2010 | Permalink | Comments (3)

The Musgrave Collection in Eastbourne is a true one-off, just like its owner, 94 year old George Musgrave. Who is this man and why does he have his own museum, you say? Well, it’s a long story.

To start at the very beginning, the first exhibit is dedicated to The Dad I Never Knew – George’s father who died in WWI when George was only two years old. Next, fast forward to the 1950s with display cases full of plastic moulds, scenery and miniscule model figures that George designed for commercial toy manufacturers in the 50s and 60s. The “Swoppets” that he designed for Herald Miniatures are fabulous things – tiny cowboys and Indians run amok along the shelves, so animated in appearance that I bet they come alive at night and continue their battles. The original models, painstakingly created from wire and Plasticine show that this is a man with a creative mind, a steady hand and an eye for detail.

After this, in a bit of a curatorial non-sequitur, are miscellaneous paintings of people, animals and Patcham Windmill near Brighton where George lived and exhibited until it was subject to a compulsory purchase order. Next, stretching right to the back of the gallery are forty paintings of St Paul - a personal project that took up decades of his life and many research trips to the Middle East and beyond.

I wasn’t even halfway round at this point but already had the measure of the Musgrave Collection - expect the unexpected. Round the next corner there it was - some portraits of famous figures like Michael Grade and Roy Castle and an amazingly detailed, very clever diorama illustrating the four seasons, beside some display cases showing the history of communication and an impressive collection of Roman coins. As a final piece de resistance, his “Speck of Dust” painting, completed at the age of 91 shows the whole history of his colourful life in one go. Even here there are more surprises like his invention of the single yellow line, Olympic swim training and teaching in Africa. It’s a life that has spanned genres, continents and centuries. Blimey.

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Posted by Anne on August 23, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (2)

Just off the sea front in Bridlington you can walk around the corner from the promenade and experience a different type of amusement arcade. Old Penny Memories allows you step back in time and play coin-operated arcade games from the heyday of British seaside entertainment.

In the entrance you can pay a pound for a cup of twenty old one penny coins which operate the majority of games. It feels good to handle the big old pennies and you get a lot of play for your pound. The main room houses a variety of games and amusements such as early pinball machines, what the butler saw, penny pushing, shooting gallery, laughing policeman (well.. he may have been a sailor), strength tester and fruit machines. Pleasant sounds of bells and chimes ring out from 'pinball alley' in the next room.

Just like modern day arcades there is a buzz in the air, children and adults move around eager to play the next game while (sixties) pop music heightens the excitement. The difference, it seems, is that people here are not hypnotised by the flashing lights, computer imagery or prospect of winning money but genuinely excited by the inventive games.

It’s tempting to call Old Penny Memories a museum as the items have been collected, cared for and shared with the public. But this may be misleading as nothing is out of bounds and you are free to play on all the arcade games, each one unique in design, craftsmanship and entertainment.

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Posted by Maraid on August 09, 2009 | Permalink

The very mention of a giant museum can cause confusion. Ironically, the Giant Angus MacAskill Museum in Dunvegan on the Isle of Skye is very small, but its contents are huge. Set in a restored Highland croft, the museum shows off the greatness of Angus MacAskill, who was born in 1825 and grew to a mighty 7’9” tall. In 1981 he was recorded in the Guinness Book of Records as the tallest “true giant” – one without underlying medical conditions or notable deformities – who ever lived.

A life-size statue of him greets visitors as they enter, towering in the corner beside his tiny companion, Tom Thumb. At this point, all sense of proportion goes out of the window. Everything in here is huge – a giant chair, an enormous jumper, socks the size of fisherman’s waders and a replica of the giant coffin that they carried him off in. It’s only when you place something actual size near the exhibits that you get a sense of how gigantic he actually was.

Born in Berneray in the Western Isles in 1825 Angus MacAskill was a small baby. At the time doctors didn’t think he would survive. But oh boy, he proved them wrong with no real indication of why he became so large. The only clue to his mighty size was a daily dish of crowdie (oatmeal and cream) after his meal. Even regular nips of whisky and a toke on his pipe didn’t stunt his growth.

Angus’s stay in Scotland was short-lived due to the Highland Clearances, and his family emigrated to Nova Scotia when he was 6 years old. They settled in Cape Breton and he worked the land in the small farming community of St Ann’s where he became known as Gille More (or ‘Big Boy’).

Tall stories of his strength and kindness have been passed down from generation to generation and were collected in the book The Cape Breton Giant by Peter Gillis. True to form he was a gentle giant, helping those who needed it and refusing frequent offers of a fight from those too foolhardy to think about what they were getting into. The story goes that when one man wouldn’t take no for an answer Angus suggested they shake on it. One handshake from MacAskill drew blood from the man’s fingers and he quickly got the message.

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Posted by Anne on August 02, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (2)

In a small Victorian arcade, bits and pieces of Biggar's bygone businesses have been carefully collected to create Gladstone Court Museum. Like a Lanarkshire equivalent of Eastbourne's Museum of Shops, the museum shows street life as it used to be. The effect is familar and strange at the same time.

There's one of everything useful - a bank, a photographer's studio, a printer's workshop, a cobblers and bootmakers, a school room, a chemists, a grocers, a drapers, a library and a telephone exchange. It’s amazing how many of these establishments you either don’t get at all these days, or find rarely. The ones that remain have changed beyond recognition so it’s great to go and have a rummage.

The shops are all open so you can have a fossick through trays of letters in the printers, goggle at the peculiar concoctions in the chemists - like liniments and concentrated flesh food, and sit at a really uncomfortable desk in the school room. The old grocer's shop, straight out of Open All Hours is fascinating. It's stacked to the rafters with beautiful brands, now long gone. It's not a big place but we spent quite a while there, explaining to the kids that this was how things used to be, even though it was before our time as well.

For a small town, Biggar is well-served by museums. Gladstone Court is one of 6 locally, and was opened in 1968 by the poet Hugh MacDiarmid who lived in the town. Some of his books are on show in the little library above the telephone exchange. Like many of Biggar's museums, the 21st century has passed it by. Quite fitting, really. There are no animatronic shopkeepers or interactive exhibits. But that’s fine. There’s lots of old stuff, it’s well laid out and you can play with it all to your heart's content.

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Posted by Anne on April 26, 2009 | Permalink

Fat fortunes were made and lost in the Butter Exchange, where now the stone cow’s head looks down, not on the city’s dairy kings, but on the visitors to the Cork Butter Museum

And it’s a sign of just how important the butter business was that it occupies the full two floors of this 19th-century building – the biggest Butter Exchange in Europe.

It’s here that you’ll learn how the lushness of the grass in the south of Ireland makes the milk particularly rich and flavoursome - the perfect raw material for really good butter.

You’ll be taken through the complete history of Irish butter, from being stored in bogs to keep ‘fresh’ - marvel at the ‘1000-year-old keg of butter’ - to the glory days of the worldwide butter empire. In fact by 1900, Cork butter was so popular it was exported to all over the globe, including Jamaica and Australia, in tins and heavily salted to preserve it during the journey. Just a few decades later refrigeration knocked the bottom out of the market until Kerry Gold modernised Irish butter production and turned the faltering trade into today’s mighty butter behemoth.

I have to admit to first being a little sniffy at the idea of a butter museum, then secretly hoping for giant butter sculptures or trombone-playing butter men a la Douglas the Lurpak mascot.

The Museum pays full tribute to a crucial section of the Irish economy. From the actual making of butter - to most of us probably a bit of mystery involving vague ideas about churning - to the selling of it, including the changing design of butter wrappers – my favourite being the one from 1922 exhorting consumers to do their patriotic duty and buy Irish Free State butter – just about every aspect of the business is covered.

And it’s located in Shandon, a hillside of shabby, decaying yet enticing little 19th century streets which are definitely worth a wee wander.

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Posted by Lucy on March 16, 2009 | Permalink

Weston-super-Mare is blessed with two special transport museums. The nippy Lambretta Museum is in town while on the outskirts, The Helicopter Museum houses a more substantial type of vehicle.

Now the world’s largest dedicated helicopter museum, it has been growing steadily since 1958, when the founder Elfan ap Rees, an aviation writer and historian started to collect rotorcraft. Now here's where the vocabulary gets interesting - rotorcraft is a complex famlly of vehicles including helicopters, autogyros (same as gyroplanes), gyrodynes and tiltrotors. It became the British Rotorcraft Museum in 1978 but that wasn’t so catchy. Whatever it’s called, every variation is here, from bizarre early prototypes to hulking military beasts. There’s even a Gyro-Boat. Either way, it's a wonder any of them got off the ground. It just doesn't seem natural.

The early days of flight are marked by the Cierva Memorial Building, named after Don Juan de la Cierva, the designer and founder of the practical autogyro (as opposed to the impractical autogyro, of which there were many). The collection contains many rare and delicate vintage craft with great names like the Thruxton Gadfly and the Campbell Cougar as well as the modern superstars of the helicopter world - the fearsome Russian Army Mil Mi-24, the G-LYNX world record speed holder and royal helicopter The Queen's Flight. And it’s not just helicopters - Helix, the only teddy bear to have completed a round the world helicopter flight is here too.

Beside the shop and cafe there's an excellent display of models (some pretty substantial) and toy helicopters including Budgie, created by Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York who trained as a pilot in the Navy. He's all but forgotten in most households, but is fondly remembered here. Kids can take a ride in a miniature Budgie, or play around in the cockpit of a proper helicopter firmly rooted to the ground outside. The museum runs a number of special "Helidays" throughout the year where vistors can enjoy helicopter rides from the beach, as well as Open Cockpit Days where grown-ups can pretend to fly too.

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Posted by Anne on March 08, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Slightly off the beaten tourist track is the small New Zealand town of Inglewood, in the province of Taranaki. It’s a popular destination for youngsters of all ages who appreciate toys with oodles of character, because this is the home of the quaintly-named Fun Ho! National Toy Museum. The building in the centre of town is easy to spot – it’s the one with a fire engine parked on the roof. The vehicle’s complement of firefighters sit bolt upright, immobile but alert, ready for the call of duty.

The museum presents the complete history of the locally-produced Fun Ho! brand of hand-made aluminium sand-cast toys, plus other New Zealand made toys, with about 3000 items on display. A car racetrack and a model railway have child-level push-buttons to get things moving.

For over 40 years untold numbers of New Zealand children grew up with Fun Ho!’s rugged little models which come up smiling even after lengthy spells of being lost in the back garden. Tractors, trucks, cars, planes, trains and many other miscellaneous toys are fondly remembered. This is dairy farming country, and the budding young cow cockie (translation: dairy farmer) could find everything he or she needed in the way of equipment.

The foundry adjacent to the museum is still in working order, and visiting groups can watch the curator/toymaker demonstrate his craft (bookings required). With sand being an essential part of the process, what better place to install a sandpit where, at non-working times, the little ones can play while older members of the family inspect the machinery.

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Posted by Annie C on January 10, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Only the truly hard-hearted can clap eyes on a bubble car without breaking into a smile. These days it's rare enough to see one never mind 70 in a row. So the fact that the National Bubble Car Museum exists at all is cause for celebration. Here it is in Byard's Leap in deepest darkest Lincolnshire, second only to the Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum in Dubble Bubble Acres, Madison, GA.

Inside a huge barn there are bubble cars or to use the more accurate term "microcars" everywhere. Their cheery countenances give the impression that they might get up to mischief once the visitors have left for the day. They're safely behind ropes lest they break free and run amok, parping out the Benny Hill theme on their horns. A colourful symbol of the freedom and optimism of the post-war era, they're just made for jolly jaunts with a wicker picnic set and tartan travelling rug, provided there's only two of you and you're not over 5'6".

The Register of Unusual Microcars (yes, there really is one) defines microcars as "economy vehicles with either three or four wheels, powered by petrol engines of no more than 700cc or battery electric propulsion, and manufactured since 1945". So within the world of microcars there are bubble cars - the ones that look particularly bubbly, either in shape or personality. The most iconic are here alright. The Messerschmitt, with its strange hammer-headed bonnet and tall bubble canopy has the air of a distinguished gentleman. It looks like it should be wearing a monocle. The cheeky Isetta, the bubbliest of them all has an unusual front-opening or "suicide" door. Funny how that didn’t catch on. They might look frivolous but they come from a prestigious background. Isettas were manufactured by BMW and Messerschmitts were made by, er, Messerschmitt famous for their WWII bombers. The bubble canopy wouldn’t look out of place on a fighter plane.

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Posted by Anne on September 27, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3)

The Bakelite Museum in Williton, Somerset is a museum of few words. At the entrance, a small sign introduces Bakelite "The material of a thousand uses". Invented by Dr Leo Baekeland in 1907 Bakelite was the world’s first, and most successful synthetic plastic, in continuous production ever since. If you think it's confined to old brown radios, think again. The museum, set over two floors in a 17th Century watermill is jam packed with Bakelite products of all shapes, sizes and colours.

Stepping in the door is like walking into a 1950s home. There are cookers, toasters, washing machines, and irons interspersed with smaller items like banks, clocks and egg cups. It is bright and resilient, in the spirit of the times. If the museum had ended here I would have gone home happy, but there's more. Next, a room of televisions, gramophones, radios and telephones is like a mini Design Museum. Plus a colourful display of elegant bowls and vases made from Bandalasta (also known as LingaLonga), a coloured, marbled variation of Bakelite which first saw light in 1925.

Up the steep stairs and into a little side room where I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. This is the colourful world of Bakelite egg cups, napkin rings and salt and pepper shakers, all perfectly lined up on curvaceous shelves. I shudder to think what the dusting overhead is like, but it looks wonderful.

From there you go onto hairdryers, electric heaters, hoovers and the last room with a full set of Bakelite teeth, picnic sets and the piece de resistance, a Bakelite coffin. As it was famous for its heat-resistant properties this didn't go too well at cremations and the product never took off. It is one of the many highly collectible items on show.

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Posted by Anne on April 27, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1)

The Museum Of Shops is sign-posted all over Eastbourne. It really whets your appetite. What an intriguing name. What could this place be? And it doesn't disappoint when you get there. It's spread over four floors in a townhouse not far from the seafront, in a quiet bit of town.

It's a massive 100,000 bit collection of, well, stuff, from the last hundred and fifty years of shops and consumption. Packaging, advertising, products, signage, clothes, ephemera, everything. The collection is crammed into themed displays with emotive mannequins acting out the part of shopkeepers. See Mr Barton in his well-stocked Grocer’s Shop. Check out the now long-gone treats available in the Sweet Shop. The Edwardian Kitchen is like a scene from Upstairs, Downstairs and the Wartime display will remind everyone large and small that we’ve never had it so good.

The focus seems to be mostly on the first half of the 20th century; if you're a thirty or forty year-old, you won't find much actual nostalgia to bathe in, but that's better in a way. You don't spend your whole time shouting 'Look! Spangles!' you actually look and think.

The museum was created by Jan and Graham Upton over a period of 50 years. They've done it really nicely. There's none of the compulsory interactivity that seems mandatory in museums nowadays. And no real attempt to create some historical context. You just gawp at the stuff and soak up the atmosphere. But it works really well, the overwhelming effect of the densely-packed sheer mass of stuff soon fades and you get to peer at the revealing little details. The tiny shop format is the perfect way to organise it – like full-size doll houses. This is a great place to pass some time.

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Posted by Russell on February 14, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1)

“It’s bigger than you think” proclaims the sign as you enter the Air Defence Radar Museum at RAF Neatishead in Norfolk. And indeed it is. We stopped by for a quick visit and came out two hours later. It turns out there's a lot to know about radar, and the museum staff (ex-RAF to a man) are only too glad to help you learn.

The museum traces the history of radar from early experiments like the sound mirrors still standing on the Kent coast, through Chain Home (the ring of coastal radar stations built by the British before and during World War II) to today's more sophisticated systems. RAF Neatishead is significant for radar enthusiasts (of which there are many) because it was home to the first secret defence system, built in 1941. It continued as a Sector Operations centre until 1993, protecting Britain through the nuclear threat of the Cold War.

The equipment used during World War II seems amazingly primitive. The Plotting Room (the room where they push things around with those big rake-type things) is staffed by dummy WAAFs (Women's Auxiliary Air Force). One thing the museum makes clear is women’s contribution to this end of the war effort. While the men were out fighting the women did their bit managing the information coming in over radar – plane positions, weather conditions. They counted them all out and counted fewer back. The museum shows complicated systems of charts, boards and obscure terminology. It must have been a demanding, relentless line of work.

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Posted by Anne on January 06, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Established in 1879, Kirkcudbright’s Stewartry Museum is full of local things for local people. In contrast to many Victorian museums this isn’t the collection of Lord So-and-So who travelled the globe plundering other cultures, it’s a charming collection of things found in and around the Stewartry, which is Kirkcudbright and the surrounding local area. Ironically, as these days other cultures are often better known than our own it ends up feeling fantastically exotic.

On the ground floor, tidily corralled into glass cases, there are various local history exhibits. They range from the organised to the fairly random in a way that makes browsing a pleasantly serendipitous experience. There are axe-heads, butter churns, fob watches and curiously an old packet of Wills’ woodbines “found in 1974 under the floorboards of a shop in St Cuthbert St”. At some points it’s less like a museum, more like the shop out of Bagpuss.

Its killer exhibit is the “Siller Gun" a shooting trophy presented to the town by James VI (later James 1st of England) in 1587 - the year before the Spanish Armada. It is still used today as the prize in shooting competitions organised by the Incorporated Trades of Kirkcudbright. Alongside, there is a more modern range of trophies, for cheese-making no less. The world needs prize-winning cheese, after all.

Upstairs on the balcony there is a natural history collection that must have kept the local taxidermists busy for years. There are birds (and birds’ eggs), animals, butterflies, insects and fish. There's something so peaceful and reassuring about stuffed things in glass cases and here they are beautifully arranged and labelled. The copperplate handwriting is an exhibit in itself and the names read like poetry - Linnet, Tree pipit, Nightjar, Stone chat.

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Posted by Anne on August 05, 2007 | Permalink

Barely hanging on to the most easterly tip of England, Great Yarmouth is the seaside town that time forgot. Within minutes of our arrival we discover this temporal isolation permeates the town's whole being.

At the core of Great Yarmouth’s time warp sits Louis Tussauds House of Wax. Its terrible likenesses have been widely mocked via viral emails and national radio.

It was the last day of our visit when we stumbled upon the grand old house, painted bright blue and white, with a small ticket booth out front and faded lettering spelling out 'House of Wax'. Disclaimers and warnings proclaim 'These waxworks are best enjoyed as snapshots in time’ and 'No Photography' - evidence its owners were stung by the email mocking their museum.

Buying tickets and stepping inside we immediately realise the wax works are just as bad as the stories had led us to believe, however it's the whole atmosphere, the entirety of the museum that makes it so fascinating.

Due to a lack of investment or more likely a lack of will, Louis Tussauds is a time capsule of the 1970s and early 80s. Jim Davidson stands proudly at the front of a display of television personalities featuring amongst others Dirty Den and Angie, Sam Fox and the cast of Dynasty. There's a whole gallery of military figures with Churchill and Hitler headlining. Modern day is represented by a lost looking Victoria and David Beckham, but they are probably just the old Morecombe and Wise figures melted down and given new hairstyles.

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Posted by Ben C on July 08, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (5)

Street in Somerset is a shoe town, well more accurately a village. Since the 1830s Clarks have been making shoes in Street, and while their shoes are now manufactured abroad, its headquarters are still located there. Within these headquarters is housed the most delightful little museum.

Passing through the corporate-style glass doors you find the introductory section which tells of the origins of Clarks and has a fabulous display of some of the fearsome foot measuring machines that used to feature in their shops. There’s also a selection of shop display showcards from the thirties, fifties and sixties. In fact ‘showcard’ does them an injustice - some are stylish and charming little 3D dioramas.

Up the wooden staircase the museum really gets into its stride, with a comprehensive chronological display of the history of shoes, housed in simple vitrines with hessian backed displays, a touch that reminds me of museums in the seventies and perhaps gives a clue as to when this museum was established. While the overriding emphasis is on shoes worn in Britain, from Roman times on, there are plenty of examples of footwear from all over the world, including some adorable Chinese silk children’s shoes. Even the most resistant visitor will soon be fascinated, as my (male) companion will happily confirm.

There’s plenty of contextual information should you need it, especially from the 19th century and on, including fashion pictures, advertisements, catalogue illustrations and photographs of shops. But its also possible, and perfectly natural, just to ooh and aah. One thing you can’t do it is rush through it - there’s so much to detain you despite its small size. Importantly, you are welcome to take pictures, something that cannot be taken for granted in many museums these days.

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Posted by Trevira on June 27, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (2)

The fact that a Dormouse Hunting Museum exists at all is reason enough to buy a plane ticket to Slovenia. The collection covers the myth and culture of the Dormouse in Slovenian national identity, as well as practical examples and diagrams showing trapping methods. The Dormouse was hunted for its pelts, which were used in dandies' hats, but the meat wasn't wasted, and the fat is apparently semi-liquid. The displays are well-laid out vitrines, given a backdrop of leaves and logs, and enlarged engravings of dormouse lore, including an image of the devil seemingly herding the dormouse, to some end.

The Museum is in the grounds of Snežnik Castle, fairly hidden from view. It's a two room affair, opening with a selection of taxidermied local animals. I was relying on my memory of spotters' books, rather than my knowledge of Slovene to identify them, but there were some obvious animals in the tattered collection: wolves, bears, stoats.

The castle itself is surrounded by a moat and locked for all but two months of the year (as we found from the keeper of the tourist information centre, in broken pidgin German: 'Die Schloss ist geoffnet?' 'Nein.' 'Heute?' 'Nein, Juni und Juli'. Within the centre in a cage scattered with half-eaten apples, were two live dormice, small, fluffy-tailed and alien-looking).

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Posted by Dan on May 17, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (2)

I have been meaning to visit The Cumberland Pencil Museum for ages. It’s been on my ‘Must Go!’ list for at least two years. So it was with great excitement that on a sunny Easter Saturday we finally tootled up the M6 to Keswick.

Nestled amongst stunning mountains Keswick is a busy, bustling Lake District tourist town – not quite as overrun with wall-to-wall outdoor equipment shops, frilly cafes and organic delis as Ambleside. Thankfully.

The Cumberland Pencil factory building itself is a great example of Art Deco era architecture; resplendent with Gill Sans signage. The actual museum is housed within a pale blue 1950s prefab decorated with large MDF pencils. It’s a cheery little place.

The entrance to the exhibition is slightly disappointing – visitors have to traipse through a room of unnecessary fake caves, complete with mining dummies whose feet are falling off. In my opinion this part of the exhibition could do with being scrapped. Perhaps in order to give more space to showing off the biggest pencil in the world – which is currently housed (not to its maximum potential) in a case in a corridor.

• Nearby Borrowdale was the first place in the world where graphite was discovered, around 1500.
• When a pencil is made – it is precisely 184mm long.
• The local name for graphite was 'wad' and upon its discovery it soon became a precious commodity. The graphite mines were taken over by the government and wad was transported to London by armed stage coach.

These are just three of the fascinating things I learnt from my visit. I also got to look at some splendid examples of pencil packaging, and some very inventive pencil displays too.

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Posted by Kate on May 09, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (3)

Childhood doesn’t belong in a museum - it’s noisy and fun, not quiet and organised. When you walk into the barn-like space that is Childhood Memories Toy Museum the overall effect is of a chaotic bedroom that’s had a last minute tidy up for visitors. The name really fits, as soon as you come in the door it’s like being a kid again, looking at a whole heap of exciting things and wondering what to play with first.

There’s obviously been an attempt to organise the huge number of toys on show. There are neat displays showing an impressive array of toy guns, robots, doll’s house furniture, Sooty & Sweep, ventriloquist’s dummies, Sindy dolls, Mr (and Mrs) Potato Heads, it goes on and on. But outside these collections toys spill everywhere. Bizarre board games such as On The Buses and I only arsked: The Bernard Breslaw Game balance on the display cases, and anything that can hang dangles from the ceiling.

In the middle of the floor large dolls and cuddly toys of all ages are corralled inside miniature vehicles. Some of the old ones would give you nightmares, their glass eyes staring at you in the dark. A teddy sits in a Sinclair C5, not actually a toy car even though it looks like one. And everything is equal here. Although many of the exhibits are highly collectable there’s no indication that that makes them more important. Classic toys are on show alongside tiny disposable things and famous names jostle with others that have been long forgotten. That makes sense – kids don’t discriminate either.

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Posted by Anne on April 15, 2007 | Permalink

Not many museums are in the attic of a rather crappy antique mall. The Lunchbox Museum in Columbus, Georgia however is not your usual museum. A massive collection of lunch boxes, lunch trays and even production artwork created to adorn lunch boxes, it's a labor of love. While its home in the attic of the River Market Antiques Mall leaves much to be desired, the sheer number of collectibles will distract from their surroundings.

For this trip, the museum was my only destination. So I saw little of Columbus in getting to the River Market Antiques Mall. After arriving, a quick outside tour of the interesting clutter, which included a folk-art covered hearse, I made my way to the door. At the front entrance I was greeted with a menu of odd museum options for my enjoyment.

"WORLD FAMOUS LUNCH BOXES, Lunch Box Museum, Recognized By The Smithsonian Institute - OVER 2000 BOXES. $5.00 VIEWING FEE
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WORLDS HIGHEST SKYLINE - 280 SQ FT. 27 BUILDINGS OVER 1000 FLOORS - 6.7 SQ MILES IN SQ MILES THIS CITY IS RATED 2ND IN THE NATION!! $2.00 VIEWING FEE PER PERSON - 8 YEARS IN THE MAKING
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MEADERS POTTERY MUSEUM OF SOUTHERN STONEWARE - BY APOINTMENT"

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Posted by Robert on January 13, 2007 | Permalink

If the walls at The Old Operating Theatre could talk, they would most likely scream in agony rather than strike up a conversation. Standing on the tiered steps which arch around the operating pit, the centre piece in one of London’s lesser known and quirkier museums, it only takes a pinch of imagination to visualise the grim realities of surgery in a time before anaesthetic. The operating table, no more than a slab of wood, stands on stripped floorboards beneath the vast glazed skylight which once provided the illumination by which the surgeons could slice. These men, often dressed in frock coats, went about their business ignorant as to the merits of antiseptic and without the benefits of effective painkillers or unconscious patients. Operations required speed, skill, a strong stomach and more than a little luck to ensure those beneath the blade survived. It’s safe to assume that during the early decades of the nineteenth century the wooden walls of the operating theatre witnessed enough gore and suffering to make even the Christmas special of ‘Casualty’ seem tame.

Getting to the operating theatre is a peculiar business as the entrance is to be found in St Thomas’s church, an eighteenth century baroque building whose dusty loft space, or garret, houses the museum. The narrow spiral staircase which leads upwards, seems ill suited to the care of the sick and the location is only explained when one learns that the church roof abuts the wards on the south wing of St Thomas’s hospital. When the church was rebuilt in the seventeenth century, the new building was constructed with a large ‘aisle barn’ garret which became home to the resident Apothecary at the neighbouring hospital. This seller and maker of medicine would have cultivated a herb garden and recent renovation work has found remains of dried opium in the rafters. Part of the museum recreates the workshop of the apothecary and the combined smells from exotic ingredients such as Frankincense, Santolina, Comfrey, Horsetail and Gum Arabic assault the nostrils as soon as you reach the top of the staircase. Signs detail the medicinal benefits of these raw materials although some remedies appear to have more in common with witchcraft than science. One of the least promising must be the recipe for Snailwater, which purports to offer a cure for venereal disease through a mixture concocted largely from crushed snails and earth worms.

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Posted by Maurice on November 25, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (1)

For some buses are an unnecessary evil – late, overcrowded and filthy, but for others they’re a way of life. The bus enthusiasts of Glasgow have taken over the former Bridgeton Bus Garage and turned it into the Glasgow Vintage Vehicle Trust. Make your way inside the huge doors to find a shed full of beautiful old buses – all shapes and sizes, and an overflow area out the back for vintage fire engines, more buses and a rather bizarre home-made Glasgow rickshaw consisting of a sofa with two bikes stuck to the front.

Taking a look round it’s almost impossible not to be transported back to your youth, wherever and whenever that was. Although the Routemaster has become the megastar of the bygone bus world it’s the green and orange Glasgow Corporation double deckers that take me back. The length and breadth of Britain is represented with buses from Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Blackpool, London and further afield. If you’re lucky you might get a chance to get on board and sit in the driver’s seat. Who can resist a shot at the big wheel?

For visitors who are pretty vintage themselves the buses of their youth might be some of the beautifully restored old coaches – wonderful colours, beautiful logos and the odd crank handle on the front. For all the buses that have been brought back to life there are plenty that have seen better days, waiting for a little TLC.

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Posted by Anne on October 14, 2006 | Permalink

The small town of Elberton, Georgia's main claim is that it is the "Granite Capital of the World". While that claim may be disputed by other international granite producers, the town does have a quaint museum dedicated to the stone that made the town and one of the most bizarre monuments ever raised. More on that in a moment.

While driving to Elberton (assuming you don't live there already), the closer communities are to the town the more likely you are to see granite signs (not the typical metal ones). People in these parts like their granite and use it for village and business names and even street numbers for private home owners.

Once you get there the Elberton Granite Museum & Exhibit is pretty easy to spot, with the biggest granite sign, of course. The museum's industrial building is home to a collection of quarry equipment, funky sculptures, examples of etched gravestones, and an old man at the desk. Pleased to have some company, he fired up the educational video that we watched while strolling the exhibits. There is something charming about the museum's genuine enthusiasm about what to most would be a mundane subject. Which leads to the most interesting granite exhibit, the model and material about the Georgia Guidestones.

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Posted by Robert on September 06, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (2)