SPECIAL EXHIBITIONS: 2009

Six special displays were enjoyed this year!

In addition to all the permanent galleries and free audio tour, in 2009 there were six special displays to enjoy.

(1) The 2009 Special Exhibition was Raising the Roof - Wallingford's Homes & their Families - a detailed look at the history of twelve representative old buildings in Wallingford (and one 20th century one), with particular emphasis on the people who lived in them. In one case we go went as far back as 1348!

(2) In the same room was Discovering Oxfordshire's Buildings, an exhibition loaned to us by the Oxford Building Record which illustrated the history of local building materials and methods.

We offered to help Wallingford visitors look into the history of their own house and asked them to bring us the results. Each visitor was also invited to put a coloured pin to mark their house on a big map - choosing a colour to match the age of the building.

(3) The Burh to Borough exhibition in the Tapestry Room was fully revised for the 2009 season, and, as in 2008, was regularly updated with the results of the year's geophysics and archaeology.

(4) Upstairs, we had a new Twentieth Century Gallery which focuses each year on a different topic - this year's was Leisure. With nostalgic items and photographs, it covered activities from enjoying the river to 'going to the flicks' at the Regal.

(5) In the shop window set we had a fascinating mixture of Recent Acquisitions and inside the shop we created The Laundry with all sorts of washing utensils and a map of where the laundresses lived in Wallingford in the nineteenth century.

(6) Finally, for children we still had the ever-popular sandpit in which you could dig for real archaeological finds, the Touchy, Feely, Smelly Drawers and the costume colouring sheets. Now they were joined by some new Shoe Bags. Each bag has the name of its owner - but only one child is keeping shoes in their Shoe Bag! Find out who it is and explore the other 'treasures' the children keep in their Shoe Bags!