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ROYAL BOROUGH OF KINGSTON UPON THAMES

KINGSTON MUSEUM AND HERITAGE SERVICE

ACQUISITIONS AND DISPOSAL POLICY

Incorporating Mission and Aims

2005

H5 Acquisition and Disposal Policy Museum: Kingston Museum Governing Body: Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames Date approved by governing body: Date at which policy due for review:

1. Existing collections, including the subjects or themes for collecting The collections comprise approximately 5150 objects covering most aspects of the local history of the Kingston area from prehistoric to the present. They include archaeology, social and working history, decorative arts and the collection of the photographer Eadweard Muybridge.

Archaeology The archaeology collection covers the period from Prehistory to the medieval period.

Prehistoric - The museum also holds a fine collection of Mesolithic flint tranchet axe heads, flint arrowheads and other flint tools and imported stone ground and polished Neolithic axe heads. There is a small collection of prehistoric pottery, particularly late Bronze Age domestic tableware. Other Bronze Age objects include axe heads, spears and arrowheads. The Iron Age collection is very small but includes a gold coin hoard.

Roman - This period is predominantly represented by building material and pottery excavated. There is also a small collection of Romano-British pottery and metalwork.

Saxon - The Saxon metalwork collection is nationally important and includes three swords, about 20 spearheads and four shield bosses from the Mitcham Pagan Saxon cemetery. The museum also holds a 10th century log boat and a collection of silver pennies representing the reigns of the seven kings thought to have been crowned at Kingston.

Medieval - There is a collection of 14th century Kingston-type Surrey Whiteware. Much of it is waster material from the excavated kiln sites. There is also a small collection of other artefacts including tools, pottery, dress accessories and domestic objects.

Social & Working History The social history collection mostly consists of 19th and 20th century domestic objects including cooking and washing equipment, costume and textiles, and household effects.

The working history is represented by objects from trade and industry, including 17th century trading tokens, pipe maker’s equipment and models from British Aerospace of Hawker jets and monoplanes.

There is a collection of civic objects including Thames Watermen’s coats, trophies, plaques, truncheons, rattles and handcuffs from a debtor’s prison. Items of military history relate to the local regiment, The East Surreys.

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Decorative Arts Large and valuable collection of late 19th century-20th century salt-glazed stoneware made by the Martin Brothers of Southall that was bequeathed to the Museum by a wealthy local businessman in 1945. Heraldic pottery and other ceramics also constitute part of the ceramic collection.

Eadweard Muybridge The Museum holds a large and internationally important collection of material bequeathed by the local 19th century photographer Eadweard Muybridge. These include his biunial lantern, zoopraxiscope, lantern slides and positives (several hundred), 71 plates from the 1884 work Human & Animal Locomotion, his newspaper cuttings book, 60 glass zoopraxiscope discs (12” and 16”) and an original panorama of San Francisco of 1878. This is a collection which attracts international visitors both in person and through web site visits.

2. Criteria governing future collecting policy, including the subjects or themes for collecting The museum’s future collecting policy draws on its mission statement and aims. These are as follows:

Mission Statement The Museum and Heritage Service will tell and celebrate stories about people’s lives in Kingston, past and present, and engage tourists, visitors and people living or working locally with local heritage and culture. The Service will achieve this through preserving, conserving and exhibiting artefacts, art works and records and offering active learning experiences based on them.

Aims

• The Service will develop high quality learning experiences with schools and the community targeted to meet different audience needs.

• The Service will offer high levels of customer service throughout its facilities and environments. It will reduce or remove all barriers to access and provide physical, sensory and intellectual access for all.

• The Service will contribute to the economic regeneration of Kingston by increasing Kingston’s status as a visitor destination through marketing its collections and associated exhibitions to a national and international audience.

• The Service values diversity and will represent, engage and work in partnership with the local community to develop collections and deliver exhibitions and events programmes.

• The Service will contribute to widening the range of cultural opportunities in the Borough and ensure that they are available to everyone.

H7 • The Service will develop its collections care programme to a high standard.

• The Service will maintain accredited status.

Therefore the criteria governing future acquisitions are:

• The Museum will acquire objects originating from, used in, or with connections to the area now designated as the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

• Objects must have been either manufactured in the area or used by or related to people or other bodies who are/were connected with, reside or are located within the area.

• The Museum has limited storage space that must be taken into account when accepting acquisitions, although space may become available in the future.

Archaeology The museum will only collect casual and chance finds from the area and from all periods of human activity. The Museum will not acquire the archive from development controlled archaeological excavations. This material will be stored in the London Archaeological Archive Research Centre (LAARC) at the Museum of London. An arrangement for borrowing any material connected with Kingston is in place with the Museum of London. Therefore the local community can still access the archaeological material via loans for museum displays and exhibitions.

The existing historic collections from earlier excavations held by the museum are subject to review and further consideration needs to be given to its suitability for transfer to LAARC.

Social & Working History The Museum will seek to collect objects that reflect the life and work of the local community. The cultural diversity of Kingston’s current community is under-represented in the museum. Emphasis will be put on redressing this weakness with particular reference to the Korean and Asian communities. In addition, the museum will aim to collect objects relating to the second half of the twentieth century.

• Costume & textiles – Costume and textiles made, worn or purchased locally and from the 18th century onwards. Weak areas in the collection include male, and 20th century costume and accessories. • Working history – Collect a representative sample of objects from the commercial and industrial businesses in Kingston. These include brewing, engineering, metalworking, pottery and the retail industries. • Leisure – Material to illustrate leisure and sporting activities. • Education – Material to illustrate the history of education in the area. • Local Government – Objects to illustrate the history and continued growth of local politics. • Commemoratives & Souvenirs – Mementoes of events and places within the area. • Domestic – Household and domestic objects particularly from the last half of the 20th century.

H8 • Ceramics – Collect material relating to the existing collections of Martinware and the work of the local potter Denise Wren.

Eadweard Muybridge The museum will continue to collect material relating to the life and work of Eadweard Muybridge. In particular the museum wishes to collect objects relating to his influence on photography and art in the 20th century.

Ethnography The Museum will not collect any further ethnographic material unless it has special relevance to the local area.

Natural History The Museum will not collect any further natural history material unless it is needed for use in the interpretation of the history of the local area.

3. Period of time and/or geographical area to which collecting relates The museum will collect objects related to the whole time span of the local area from Prehistory to the present. The local area is defined by the boundary of the modern Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

4. Limitations on collecting The museum recognises its responsibility, in acquiring additions to its collections, to ensure that care of collections, documentation arrangements and use of collections will meet the requirements of the Accreditation Standard. It will take into account limitations on collecting imposed by such factors as inadequate staffing, storage and care of collection arrangements.

5. Collecting policies of other museums The museum will take account of the collecting policies of other museums and other organisations collecting in the same or related areas or subject fields. It will consult with these organisations where conflicts of interest may arise or to define areas of specialisms, in order to avoid unnecessary duplication and waste of resources.

Specific reference is made to the following museums: • Museum of London for social history and archaeology relating to the Kingston area • Science Museum and National Museum of Photography, Film and Television for material relating to Eadweard Muybridge • Elmbridge Museum for material relating to the playwright RC Sherriff • Southall Public Library for Martinware pottery • The Queen’s Royal Surrey Regiment for material relating to the East Surrey Regiment

6. Policy review procedure The Acquisition and Disposal Policy will be published and reviewed from time to time, at least once every five years. The date when the policy is next due for review is noted above.

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The Regional Agency / Museum Council / CyMAL will be notified of any changes to the Acquisition and Disposal Policy, and the implications of any such changes for the future of existing collections.

7. Acquisitions not covered by the policy Acquisitions outside the current stated policy will only be made in very exceptional circumstances, and then only after proper consideration by the governing body of the museum itself, having regard to the interests of other museums.

8. Acquisition procedures a. The museum will exercise due diligence and make every effort not to acquire, whether by purchase, gift, bequest or exchange, any object or specimen unless the governing body or responsible officer is satisfied that the museum can acquire a valid title to the item in question. b. In particular, the museum will not acquire any object or specimen unless it is satisfied that the object or specimen has not been acquired in, or exported from, its country of origin (or any intermediate country in which it may have been legally owned) in violation of that country’s laws. (For the purposes of this paragraph `country of origin’ includes the United Kingdom). c. In accordance with the provisions of the UNESCO 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, which the UK ratified with effect from November 1 2002, and the Dealing in Cultural Objects (Offences) Act 2003, the museum will reject any items that have been illicitly traded. The governing body will be guided by the national guidance on the responsible acquisition of cultural property issued by DCMS in 2005. d. The museum will not acquire any biological or geological material. e. The museum will not acquire archaeological antiquities (including excavated ceramics) in any case where the governing body or responsible officer has any suspicion that the circumstances of their recovery involved a failure to follow the appropriate legal procedures, such as reporting finds to the landowner or occupier of the land and to the proper authorities in the case of possible treasure as defined by the Treasure Act 1996 (in England, Northern Ireland and Wales) or reporting finds through the Treasure Trove procedure (in Scotland). f. Any exceptions to the above clauses 8a, 8b, 8c, or 8e will only be because the museum is either: ƒ acting as an externally approved repository of last resort for material of local (UK) origin; or ƒ acquiring an item of minor importance that lacks secure ownership history but in the best judgement of experts in the field concerned has not been illicitly traded; or ƒ acting with the permission of authorities with the requisite jurisdiction in the country of origin; or ƒ in possession of reliable documentary evidence that the item was exported from its country of origin before 1970.

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In these cases the museum will be open and transparent in the way it makes decisions and will act only with the express consent of an appropriate outside authority.

9. Spoliation The museum will use the statement of principles ‘Spoliation of Works of Art during the Nazi, Holocaust and World War II period’, issued for non-national museums in 1999 by the Museums and Galleries Commission.

10. Repatriation and Restitution The museum does not hold/nor will acquire objects from other countries.

11. Management of archives See appended document.

12. Disposal procedures a. By definition, the museum has a long-term purpose and should possess (or intend to acquire) permanent collections in relation to its stated objectives. The governing body accepts the principle that, except for sound curatorial reasons, there is a strong presumption against the disposal of any items in the museum’s collection. b. The museum will establish that it is legally free to dispose of an item. Any decision to dispose of material from the collections will be taken only after due consideration. c. When disposal of a museum object is being considered, the museum will establish if it was acquired with the aid of an external funding organisation. In such cases, any conditions attached to the original grant will be followed. This may include repayment of the original grant. d. Decisions to dispose of items will not be made with the principal aim of generating funds. e. Any monies received by the museum governing body from the disposal of items will be applied for the benefit of the collections. This normally means the purchase of further acquisitions but in exceptional cases improvements relating to the care of collections may be justifiable. Advice on these cases will be sought from MLA. f. A decision to dispose of a specimen or object, whether by gift, exchange, sale or destruction (in the case of an item too badly damaged or deteriorated to be of any use for the purposes of the collections), will be the responsibility of the governing body of the museum acting on the advice of professional curatorial staff, if any, and not of the curator of the collection acting alone. g. Once a decision to dispose of material in the collection has been taken, priority will be given to retaining it within the public domain, unless it is to be destroyed. It will therefore be offered in the first instance, by gift, exchange or sale, directly to other Accredited Museums likely to be interested in its acquisition. h. If the material is not acquired by any Accredited Museums to which it was offered directly, then the museum community at large will be advised of the intention to dispose of the material, normally through an announcement in the Museums Association’s Museums Journal, and in other professional journals where appropriate.

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i. The announcement will indicate the number and nature of specimens or objects involved, and the basis on which the material will be transferred to another institution. Preference will be given to expressions of interest from other Accredited Museums. A period of at least two months will be allowed for an interest in acquiring the material to be expressed. At the end of this period, if no expressions of interest have been received, the museum may consider disposing of the material to other interested individuals and organisations. j. Full records will be kept of all decisions on disposals and the items involved and proper arrangements made for the preservation and/or transfer, as appropriate, of the documentation relating to the items concerned, including photographic records where practicable in accordance with SPECTRUM Procedure on de-accession and disposal.

Museum Acquisitions and Disposal Policy, amended 2005 (previous versions, 1988,1992, 1994, 1996, 2000).

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ACQUISITIONS POLICY ARCHIVES AND LOCAL STUDIES ROYAL BOROUGH OF KINGSTON UPON THAMES Date approved by governing body: Date for review:

The principal aim of the Service is to locate, collect, preserve and make available for public research original records and secondary source material in all formats which have been created by the Borough or its predecessors and by other bodies, businesses and individuals living in or connected with places in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

Objectives - Archives 1. To preserve the charters and other records of historical importance created by the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames and its predecessor bodies and make them available for research. 2. To locate and preserve modern departmental records created by the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames which are considered to be of potential historical importance, having due regard for the confidentiality and closure periods applicable. These may be in any format. The Borough has a duty to care for its records under the Local Government Act 1972 3. To locate, receive on deposit or by gift or purchase, historically important records of bodies, societies, businesses, estates and individuals connected with places now or formerly within the Royal Borough boundaries, having due regard for confidentiality where applicable. Acquisitions purchased with the assistance of grant aid will be held subject to the terms and conditions of bodies from whom such aid has been received.

4. To receive on deposit certain classes of Public Records under the Public Records Act, 1958, for which the Royal Borough holds an Instrument of Appointment from the Lord Chancellor. Records transferred to the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames archive must comply with The National Archives Standard for the preparation of records for transfer to the PRO or approved places of deposit http://www.pro.gov.uk/recordsmanagement/standards/preparation.htm

5. To make available to the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, its members and employees and the public by lists and finding aids at the earliest opportunity.

6. To preserve these records in accordance with BS5454:2000 Recommendations for the storage and exhibition of archival documents and the guidelines of The National Archives.

7. Collecting Policies: Other Record Offices. The Archive will take into account the collecting policies of the Surrey History Centre and the London Metropolitan Archives.

Objectives - Local Studies 1. To locate, purchase or receive by gift or deposit published works relating to the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

2. To locate, purchase or receive by gift or deposit ephemera of historical interest relating to the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

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3. To maintain and extend the local newspaper collection both in hard copy and microfilm format

4. To maintain and extend the collection of maps and plans for the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.

5. To locate, purchase or receive by gift or deposit fine art and drawings where the subject matter relates to the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames or where the artist has local connections.

6. To add to the existing Oral History collection with specific reference to ethnic minority communities such as Korean and Tamil, craft and industrial activities in the area and customs and practice.

7. To locate, purchase or receive by gift or deposit old photographs of the Borough and to encourage new photographic projects.

8. To acquire historical resources in microform or other electronic format for the use of researchers.

END 2000. (Previous versions: 1992, 1994,1998, 2000).