By John Reeve
Crispin and I attended the launch for a report and a forthcoming publication from Birkbeck‘s Mapping Museums 1960- 20 project led by Prof Fiona Candlin. The emphasis is on smaller and independent museums getting fewer than 10,000 visitors a year, and ranging from military history to witchcraft and with a lot of local history [over 700] and folk museums, many staffed by volunteers. In the space of 6 years the team of 6 has created a comprehensive database, and Fiona has visited many of the museums in her temperamental camper van.
Among the findings: You may not be surprised to know that the number of museums in the UK tripled during the 1960- 2020 period but many also closed, after a peak in the 70s and 80s. In terms of content, beliefs and identity doesn’t figure strongly, compared for example to war and conflict.
Independent museums make up at least 71.5% of the total UK sector. 758 museums have closed, which is 18.7% of the total number of museums open since 1960. The assumption that museums survive and that they keep collections for posterity is misplaced.
A random taste of what’s here on the database:
Baird Museum of TV
Baked Bean Museum Of Excellence
Bakelite Museum
Bakewell Old House Museum
Baldock Museum
Balfour Museum Of Hampshire Red Cross History
Bar Convent
https://museweb.dcs.bbk.ac.uk/home is the project website
http://blogs.bbk.ac.uk/mapping-museums/ is the project blog
https://museweb.dcs.bbk.ac.uk/static/pdf/MappingMuseumsReport2020_SecondEdition2022.pdf is the report
https://museweb.dcs.bbk.ac.uk/aboutapp is the excellent database
Publications: ‘Mapping Museums 1960- 20 a report on data’ is published by Birkbeck, University of London
Fiona Candlin, Toby Butler, and Jake Watts, Stories From Small Museums (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2022) is out soon
Archive: The booklets, leaflets, and postcards that were collected in the course of the research are lodged in the Micromuseums Archive at the Bishopsgate Institute in the City of London. Sound files of the interviews conducted by the Mapping Museums team are also available via Bishopsgate. The archive is open access and has an online catalogue. More information is available on the Bishopsgate Archive website.
Religion & Collections 