Wallingford Museum - what's new



						LATEST NEWS Six new displays to enjoy this year! The Museum is now open for the 2009 season and, in addition to all the permanent galleries and free audio tour, there are six new displays to enjoy. (1) The 2009 Special Exhibition is 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 as far back as 1348! (2) In the same room is Discovering Oxfordshire's Buildings, an exhibition loaned to us by the Oxford Building Record which illustrates the history of local building materials and methods. We offer to help Wallingford visitors look into the history of their own house and ask them to bring us the results. Each visitor is also invited to put a coloured pin to mark their house on our big map - choose a colour to match the age of the building. (3) The Burh to Borough exhibition in the Tapestry Room has been fully revised for the 2009 season, and, as last year, will be constantly updated with the results of this year's geophysics and archaeology. (4) Upstairs, we have a new Twentieth Century Gallery which will focus each year on a different topic - this year's is Leisure. With nostalgic items and photographs, it covers activities from enjoying the river to 'going to the flicks' at the Regal. (5) In the shop window set we have a fascinating mixture of Recent Acquisitions and inside the shop we now have 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 have the ever-popular sandpit in which you can dig for real archaeological finds, the Touchy, Feely, Smelly Drawers and the costume colouring sheets. Now they have been 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! 2009 Special Events Our regular Family Archaeology Day will be held this year on SUNDAY 19 JULY based in the courtyard behind the Museum from 10.00am until 4.00pm. Last year's was a big success, attracting 39 adults and 41 children to try their hands at wielding a trowel, drawing their finds, making a clay pot or rubbing an historic coin. Pictured below are (below left) Museum archaeologist Colin Clarke explaining what the children have 'excavated' and (above right) Museum Chairman Steve Capel-Davies demonstrating how to make a basic clay pot. Pictured left are some young pot-makers learning their craft! This year's event will include free guided visits to the Burh to Borough excavations on the Castle site and elsewhere in the town and a special TWO-FOR-ONE entry offer for the Museum. Drop into the Museum between 10.00am and 4.00pm to find out when and where the events are taking place. This year's second FREE Finds & Fossils Day will be held on Saturday 12 September at the Museum from 10.00am until 1.00pm. Our resident experts will be on hand to identify your fossils and archaeological finds (but not antiques please). Fossils will be in the hands of Dr Steve Head (pictured left) and the archaeological finds will be identified by Anni Byard, our Finds Liaison Officer of the Portable Antiquities Scheme. Bring along anything you've found that you would like to know more about. Also on Saturday 12 September there will more of the popular Historic Guided Walks with our local historian, Judy Dewey, pointing out aspects of your town you've never noticed before! The Castle Walk will start at 11.00am and the Town Walk at 2.30pm. Each will take approximately an hour and a half and will start at the Museum. Cost is £3 and proceeds go to the Museum's fund-raising campaign. Sorry - no dogs! Record Visitor Figures in 2008! Overall visitor figures for 2008 have exceeded 2007 - which was then our most successful to date! Adult visitors totalled 1,788 compared to last year's 1,716 and there were dramatic increases in figures for children (602 compared to 411 the previous year); group visits (14 compared to 6) and visitors just browsing in the bookshop (more than 1,018 compared to the 825 plus of 2007). This is very good news in the current national climate of declining figures. "Wallingford's Artistic Legacy" - a huge success! Record numbers of visitors (over 500 - sometimes as many as 50 in a day!) came in November to see our unique art exhibition *Wallingford’s Artistic Legacy: the Victorian Painters, their Pupils & Descendants.* Among the ninety or so original paintings on show were examples of the work of the major Victorian painters who lived in Wallingford: the Hayllar and Leslie families and their friend and neighbour Claude Rowbotham, plus paintings by their local pupils, especially featuring Kate Latter. Also on show were reproductions and some originals from South Africa and New Zealand of the works of Hayllar & Leslie’s descendants. Most of the large collection of Rowbothams and Latter paintings were of local views, like this painting of Wallingford Bridge by Kate Latter (Mrs Allaway if you are puzzled by the initials KMA!). Most of the paintings had never been seen in public before - and probably never will again! In addition to the Hayllars and Leslie paintings, the twenty or so Rowbothams and thirty Latters, there were paintings by Fred Horley, Annie Routh, and HW Margetson and his wife and daughter. The story was brought up-to-date with paintings by three living artists: 'Pinkey' Watermeyer, a South African descendant of the Leslies, Rory Mackay, a Wimbledon descendant of the Hayllars and Peggy Shiner who is probably Kate Latter's oldest living pupil! Visitors were given a free catalogue and for 50p could take away a little booklet which summarised the Artists' lives (copies of which are still available in the Museum Bookshop). Latter Painting © and first published by Wallingford Museum. Photos by Stuart Dewey Joint Publicity Venture Wallingford Museum has joined with four other local attractions to create a new publicity partnership - Days Out around Wallingford & the Wittenhams. The other organisations are: Pendon Museum, Project Timescape, Dorchester Abbey Museum and the Cholsey & Wallingford Railway. Each organisation helps promote the others so tourists - both local and from afar - are encouraged to "make a day of it" by visiting two or three of the attractions on the same day. Each attraction has a link to the special "Days Out" website which includes a map - click here - and we have produced a joint leaflet. 'Burh to Borough' Project The Museum and TWHAS (see below) are involved in a major research programme led by archaeologists from the Universities of Exeter, Leicester and Oxford. It includes archival research, geophysics surveys and practical archaeology, all based in and around Wallingford. For three weeks in July last year, there were three major excavations taking place: on the Kinecroft, Bullcroft and the Castle site. As the results emerge, they will be presented in the Museum. To find out the latest news on the project, visit its website by clicking here. STOP PRESS: 2009 Excavations will be Saturday 4 July - Saturday 25 July TWHAS Information This website also hosts pages about our sister organisation, The Wallingford Historical and Archaeological Society. The meetings programme for 2009 can be found here. Recently made available for local historians and those researching their family history is the TWHAS Documents Group WALLINGFORD NAMES INDEX. For details click here.