REFLECTIONS 13 August 2021

We are pleased to welcome the staff and volunteers at Foxton Locks to our monthly newsletter which is currently distributed to all staff and volunteers at , National Waterways Museum Ellesmere Port, National Waterways Museum Gloucester, Standedge Tunnel, Stoke Bruerne Museum and the Trevor Basin Visitor Centre & Pontcysyllte Aqueduct.

Please will all staff/Task Managers in consultation with Lead Volunteers ensure all volunteer teams receive this latest edition. We appear to be getting closer to being able to formulate a distribution list from Sugar but not quite there yet.

Let’s Reconnect Programme

The Let’s Reconnect programme continues to enable colleagues to meet each other face to face after months and months of virtual meetings and lockdowns, with a variety of activities taking place across the Trust. The attractions have seen an increase in colleagues visiting them as part of this programme, with many visiting for the first time. Activities have included volunteer picnics, Yoga at Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, Top of the World Tours at Anderton Boat Lift and Coffee and Cake at Gloucester Museum.

You can see snippets of these in the video https://youtu.be/kDhHvJthE_U With thanks to all those across the Trust who contributed the clips and to Chris Kay for editing them into the final video.

'Bake offs' have also been taking place across the Trust in various locations and are a celebration of all those missed birthday cakes through lockdown. The next one will be on Friday 27th August at 11.30am at NWM Ellesmere Port. Bakers and Tasters needed to join in the fun! (Drinks provided by the Trust). Bring your homemade cakes and join in the 'testing' with our prestigious judges and find out who will be crowned the NW 'Bake off' Champion with newly commissioned prizes. To attend this event, whether a Baker and/or a Taster please register on Eventbrite via the following link. https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/lets-reconnect-birthday-bake-off-tickets-166797215963

Walk The Lift

If you would like the opportunity to Walk The Anderton Lift there are spaces still available on Wednesday 18 and Thursday throughout the day. Please check on Trust Ed or check with the local team.

Foxton Locks

Life at Foxton is ever changing and 2021 has seen an increase in the number of visitors. As the country started to re-emerge at the beginning of the year, locals started to rediscover Foxton, which is a 34-acre countryside destination. It’s a fantastic place to walk around and to exercise and the site now sees more regular visitors than ever before. Many people are taking advantage of the free events that are offered on site such as guided walks, bug hunting, Let’s Paint, canoeing and pond dipping. Boat traffic also continues to increase and volunteers are on hand to supervise boaters through the staircase locks. There is a real summer buzz and the are back in business, helping to open gates and watch the boats pass by.

Seven new volunteers have joined the team in a Welcome Host role which is a new volunteering opportunity for the Trust. They get involved with activities but are also on hand to assist visitors as necessary. There are 4 new volunteer keepers and 2 new maintenance volunteers. So, the team is a little bigger, but as always, they are enthusiastic and ready to help visitors experience a great day out. In July, Foxton hosted a trial camp-over for volunteers which proved successful; and then in August welcomed 20 young people for a Gold Duke of Edinburgh residential. This was a 5-day camp-over and the aim was to complete a number of projects. They helped to build a new gate for the nature pond field, a new orchard path and helped with clearing the Inclined Plane. The results have been amazing, as shown in the photographs below and the students’ work will enable the site to offer even more variety to visitors. The orchard has a collection of rare apple trees, but they were inaccessible as the path was so uneven. Now the site will be able to offer an idyllic place to relax amongst beautiful fruit trees. The Inclined Plane has had the tracks cleared and so it is easier for visitors to understand how the old boat lift worked. There is further work to be done, but it is hoped the Inclined Plane will reopen so that visitors can get a closer view of this wonderful feat of engineering.

Carl Beaumont has joined the team as a seasonal and he will work alongside Alex Goode and Julie Nottingham. The team will stay busy as Foxton will be hosting TrustFest this coming weekend (14-15 August) and a trailer on tour event in September. This busy destination is open for business and expects to build on the success so far.

Stoke Bruerne

It has been all go at Stoke Bruerne Canal Museum since reopening with a whole host of different activities and delicious local treats in the café. A new volunteering role has been introduced, called Visitor Welcome which has proved a great success. They have been instrumental in helping deliver a fantastic customer service experience and looking forward to welcoming more into this role.

The Explorer’s team welcomed back a number of school groups for the first time since reopening and post pandemic.

Supported by the regional events team, the museum has been lucky enough to host several family activities this summer such as the Lego Big Build which as you can imagine went down a treat. The museum also welcomed 1940s dancers and is soon to host blacksmithing demonstrations which will surely be a hit.

The Canal Museum has also hosted a number of the reconnection events giving lots of people the opportunity to experience the new offer for themselves.

Trevor Basin Visitor Centre and Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

What an amazing couple of months with lots of visitors returning and the glorious sunshine has certainly helped.

Andy Peters was welcomed when he was presenting the ITV morning competitions. He was filming live along the Llangollen canal and Pontcysyllte Aqueduct all week.

A Let's Reconnect session was hosted here for staff which included some relaxing yoga and a tour of the site.

Michael Ball's Wonderful Wales has just finished airing on Channel 5, but it's still available to watch on catch-up and of course features the amazing Pontcysyllte Aqueduct.

The Visitor Centre has had a few new volunteers lately, a wonderful warm welcome to Peter, Sarah, Gwyn, Catherine and Mike.

Let's Fish is back every Saturday throughout August and the Let's Yoga events are continuing every Tuesday morning.

Anderton Boat Lift and National Waterways Museum Ellesmere Port

Catch 22: Youth opportunities in the North West

Anderton Boat Lift and National Waterways Museum are very excited to be working with Catch 22 to provide opportunities for young people aged 18-24 to work with the teams to develop core skills in customer service. The young people are employed by Catch 22 and seconded to the Trust for a nine- month period. Secondment applications are open from 9 - 24 August with interviews taking place week beginning 30 September. Hopefully there will be two secondees at NWM and 2 secondees at ABL with a work focus on customer service and the environment.

Museum Estate and Development Fund Application

The museum has been shortlisted to be one of the applicants to go forward with a full application to the Arts Council’s MEND (Museum Estate and Development Fund) programme for the Pump House and Island Warehouse.

Asset Improvement Plan

An Asset Improvement Plan will be undertaken at the National Waterways Museum in Ellesmere Port. This piece of work will involve an in-depth condition survey for each building on site, and subsequently what is needed for each building. This will be undertaken over the next few months and will inform the museum’s next business plan as well as support the MEND funding application as above.

Initial Concepts for ABL & NWM

Initial concepts for NWM & ABL have been shared with colleagues in the North West as work starts to explore the potential of each site for the future. Early stages and you can find out more through the video link: https://web.microsoftstream.com/video/2da248a3-44ed-4548-a9d4-af4d9c9ba245

Learning & Skills at Anderton Boat Lift

Throughout July and August, a Young Rangers youth volunteering pilot has been running with a group of home educated young people. They have been learning about habitats, biodiversity and ecology whilst taking part in volunteer activities in the grounds. As part of the programme, they have sown a wildflower meadow, conducted biodiversity surveys, constructed a pond, frog & toad abode, insect village and bee hotel as well as capturing some fantastic footage on the wildlife camera! Huge thanks to the staff at the boat lift for supporting this initiative, particularly to Elliot who has been indispensable. Moving forward, the team will be providing 12 weeks of youth volunteering for 32 students from Petty Pool College between September and December 2021.

Learning & Skills at National Waterways Museum EP

Each Thursday and Friday throughout the summer holidays, a family learning programme for Westminster Families Community Group has been running. There are 70 families taking part with 50 people per day booked onto activities. They have been creating art from reclaimed materials, building insect villages, doing canal & river inspired yoga, building balloon powered vehicles, taking part in sketch crawls, geocaching and much more! Working in partnership with the local council, funding has been secured to provide lunches for all the families taking part and also to provide all 70 families with annual passes to the museum. Massive thanks to Michelle and the front of house team for facilitating this.

Heavenly Steps

Photographs of Di Skilbeck courtesy of Chris Bacon.

Gifford now has a new set of steps so the back cabin can be accessed safely. The steps allow an easy step up from the ground and a secure step down into the well deck. The steps have been custom built for the boat at her present site and have been designed and made on site by some of the Site Maintenance team. Chris Bacon and Don Readman were the leading lights and their careful measuring and fitting have ensured that the steps are a superb fit, they are steady and sturdy.

Di Skilbeck was very honoured to declare the steps ‘open’ using a pair of shears to cut the hazard tape!! Please note that the red carpet has been replaced by non-slip patches.

Very many thanks for a very professional step arrangement, designed, built, painted and fitted by the Step Men.

Summer at the Museum

During the summer school holidays the museum has been trialling a few new activities under the umbrella of Canal Town and has already received some really positive feedback from visitors who have loved seeing the site coming to life and chatting with its costumed characters.

Thanks to the Wirral Community Narrowboat Trust, the museum has been able to offer visitors half hour accessible trips to the winding hole and back five times a day for four days a week. These will continue until Sunday 5 September.

Sunday 15 August will see a special Canal Town feature day where Sue Day will bring her horses and do two harnessing demonstrations at 11am and 2pm outside the stables. Once harnessed, the horse will tow the heritage boat, Gifford, along the canal to the winding hole and back, with visitors following behind. In addition, the close harmony duo band, LocTup Together, will perform canal and maritime themed songs on board and in the museum.

Sunday 5 September sees the museum hosting the Mayoral Celebration for Councillor Lisa Denson, the Mayor of Ellesmere Port. She is inviting residents to this celebration for an activity filled, fun and free day out. Lisa is a familiar face at the museum, and she has included the museum as one of her three chosen mayoral charities for the year.

The Let’s Fish programme at the museum scheduled for August has been so popular that all places have been booked and it is hoped to have some more Let’s Fish events for September and the October Half Term. In September, the museum will see the beginning of the Let’s Walk programme which will take visitors on a guided walk around the outside of the museum as well as within.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to these summer activities.

Second Hand Books

If you have treated yourself to some books to read over the summer and you have finished them, please give them to Reception so that they can be put into the second-hand bookshop and be enjoyed by others. Thank you.

Ellesmere Port Local and Family History Society

The society will be holding its next meeting on Tuesday 17 August at 7.30pm in the café at the National Waterways Museum. I think the Museum would prefer us to still wear masks inside the building.

Ellesmere Port’s Police Community Support Officers, Amanda Hughes (Community PCSP) and Matt Fullager (Beat PCSO) from the Grange area will be talking about their busy present day role. This will be supplemented by the history of the Police in Ellesmere Port. Some of the traumas and mysteries of the Town’s past will be revealed!

Membership for the remainder of this calendar year is £8 (5 meetings) and all are welcome to join. Visitors are asked to pay £4 for each of two meetings, which also means, once paid, full membership for the remaining months of the calendar year.

News from Collections and Archives

Rossfield Road

Works are now underway with a completion date set for Nov 24th. Work involves a new roof, wall cladding (insulation), new shutters, full mechanical and electrical works and welfare facilities. The work is taking place with the boats in situ, but they have been covered to protect from dust and netting will be put up to protect from bits dropping during the roof works.

Movement of Collections from Lime Shed to Island Warehouse

The decant of Collections from the Lime Shed to the Island Warehouse should be completed this week. Two volunteers (Dave Russell & Barry Green) have started work on updating the documentation and the identification/preparation of items suitable for presenting to the Collections Advisory Board for disposal. Steve Bagley and Georgina Wilson-Williams are preparing Information Boards for Museum visitors as to why the collection is being temporarily stored in the Island Warehouse and arranging for barriers to make the environment safe.

Gloucester

Activities on the Water

On 21 and 22 August there will be a weekend of water-based activities by the National Waterways Museum in the Gloucester Docks. Anyone keen to have a go at canoeing, kayaking or stand-up paddle boarding is invited to book a session to learn a new skill while getting some exercise and having fun.

There will be boats on display from Gloucester Sea Cadets and the Ministry of Defence. And on dry land Just Row Gloucestershire’s rowing boat simulator will give the feeling of being on the water – without the risk of getting wet.

The Canal & River Trust Explorers team will be posing an engineering challenge with its Build a Crane and there’ll be a chance to learn about water flumes with the Trust’s hydrology team.

Everyone booking an activity will have a chance to visit the museum at a discounted price and learn about the rich history of the docks they have just been paddling in.

VAQAS Report

The National Waterways Museum Gloucester received its annual visit from the Visit England Visitor Attraction Quality Scheme and although the full report is not yet available, the initial feedback was positive. The score is likely to be at least 1% higher than the previous assessment, which is pretty good considering the challenges of the last 18 months.

In particular, well done to all the front of house team who scored 92% on customer service which is absolutely outstanding and a 3 point increase on the last assessment.

Volunteering day

There is a corporate volunteering day at the National Waterways Museum Gloucester on 17th August where the volunteers will (hopefully) be doing wonders to the quayside with weeding, bench painting and planting. Please check with the local team for more information.

Summer in the Gloucester Docks

The National Waterways Museum Gloucester is taking part in a Visit Gloucester initiative to get families to visit different venues across Gloucester this summer with the My Gloucester Passport. If they manage to get 8 stickers on their passport then they get a prize from Visit Gloucester. The Museum sticker features Well-B and fingers crossed that Well-B will be making in-person appearances through the summer holidays!

Staffing and Volunteer News

Explorers at Gloucester Anna Birt from the Canal & River Trust Explorers has now officially become part of the museum team as a permanent employee. Anna works as the Learning and Skills Coordinator which involves recruiting, training and supporting a group of enthusiastic volunteers. She runs Explorers workshops which enrich the curriculum for primary school children and adds interest and water safety for local scouting and girl guiding groups. Anna has already been working at the museum for a number of years, but it’s brilliant to finally be able to have her permanently on board with the Wales & South West Museum & Attractions team. The photo shows Anna, mid experiment!

Front of House Summer Staff at Ellesmere Port

A warm welcome to three new staff who have been appointed to the Front of House Team – Sharlene Schembri (Duty Manager), Leyla Hughes and Daniel Smith (both Museum Assistants).

Sharlene has always been interested in History and most recently, has taken an interest in East Asian historical culture and is even learning Korean! She has a passion for upcycling/reusing/recycling and enjoys many crafts. She adores animals and loves the British countryside. Having grown up mostly in Malta (she’s half Maltese) she looks forward to her annual visit to see friends and family.

Leyla is from Shropshire and loves museums. She plays and watches a lot of tennis and has been to Wimbledon three times. She has a dog called Ruby – a Staffy Cross.

Dan is a member of and volunteers for the Sea Cadets. He enjoys outdoor activities including hiking, mountain biking, wild swimming and kayaking. He has built his own computer and enjoys cars and motorbikes and is looking forward to learning more about boats.

Elaine Clay-Thompson

Elaine Clay-Thompson will be leaving the Trust later this month. Elaine has been with the National Waterways Museum Gloucester for almost six years now and has been a much-valued member of the team and it will be incredibly sad to see her go. She is leaving to start training as a Primary School Teacher later this year – a job she will be absolutely fantastic at and the whole team wish her all the best in this exciting new chapter.

Elaine’s last day in work will be 27th August.

Retirement of Jim McKeown

Some of you may be aware that Jim McKeown will be retiring at the end of this month, after 47 years at the museum both as a volunteer and as a member of staff (40 years). The museum will just not be the same without Jim.

The ‘Birthday Bake Off’ will be held on Jim’s last day, Friday 27 August and Jim has been appointed to be the Head Judge for the competition. Everyone is cordially invited to attend (and enter the bake off). If you wish to attend, please remember to register via Eventbrite https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/lets-reconnect-birthday-bake-off-tickets- 166797215963

Jim says “Thank you to all those who have assisted me in everything I have done over the years. You know who you are.”

An appreciation of Ailsa Rutherford

It was with great sadness that we learnt that Ailsa died from cancer on 19 July 2021.

Ailsa joined the Boat Museum Society (later the Waterways Museum Society (WMS)) in 2009 and soon became involved in many tasks at the Museum and in the Society. It wasn’t long before she was co-opted onto the WMS committee and she chaired the Publicity and Promotions Group which instigated the review and development of the WMS website, working closely with Steve Sunley and becoming joint editor of the web page. Ailsa soon became editor of Re:Port, the WMS newsletter and along with Dave Ditchfield became joint Membership Secretary.

Ailsa always supported Museum events - information provider/welcome/wrist bands come to mind, as well as clearing café tables and general help and assistance. Each year she and Sue James went to the Crick Boat Show, representing the Museum and she was heavily involved with the Mendip trip to Bournville in 2011 and Ilkeston’s journey to London. In 2019, Ailsa was part of the team which supported the Museum’s successful presence at the Festival de Loire d'Orleans.

Dave Ditchfield has commented: “I worked with Ailsa for about 7 years in the Collections department and Archives at the museum. She was great to work with, always ready with a smile, no matter what else was going on in her life. No job was too small, or too big for her, she just willingly did what needed doing. She was quite happy to get dirty and make an exhibition of herself! Ailsa did enjoy investigating; if we were cataloguing an object that was interesting, unusual or uncared for, Ailsa would put her detective’s hat on and start researching. She was great with visitors and loved talking to and involving them. If she was asked a question and she didn’t know the answer, she would make a determined effort to find out and let them know. She rarely took things at face value was always questioning the reasons about things - always an advantage in BMS/WMS committee meetings.”

Linda Barley, Archivist at the Museum 2005 – 2020 writes: “Along with her other voluntary work at the Museum, Ailsa also found time to volunteer for the Archives, working with John Benson on Fridays. She soon became an invaluable member of the archive team, tackling and improving complex databases, indexing several collections and latterly monitoring the comment feed on the online catalogue. This involved answering research questions where she could and checking amendments offered by the public before transferring them to the catalogue entries. It was during the last eighteen months that I really got to know Ailsa as she offered to take over responding to the ever-increasing comments and queries from the website. This helped to lighten my load during a very difficult and busy time for both of us. Without her support that part of the service would not have been possible during the Pandemic/Lockdown. Her ability and willingness to turn her hand to any task with cheerful enthusiasm whilst also offering improvements was much appreciated and her contribution to the work of the Waterways Archive is greatly missed.”

The museum has lost a dedicated volunteer who did her utmost to support the museum. Ailsa was a reliable and trust worthy friend and will be sorely missed by all.

Her funeral was held in early August with financial donations going to the Macmillan Nurses from whom she had marvellous support throughout her illness. She requested that people wore normal colourful clothing and to avoid black if possible so in that spirt we have put together a collage of some of her lighter moments for you to remember her by.

Photo from top left clockwise – in costume with Sue James, Liz Phillips & Gaynor Bell; walking the first 20 miles with Celia who walked to Birmingham along the to raise funds for Breast Cancer; dancing with Sue James at Santa Cruises and working in Collections appropriately gloved.

Please remember to share your stories with us.

Please look after yourselves, families and friends and stay safe. Please send any contributions to Michelle Kozomara [email protected] and Barbara Kay [email protected] by 5pm on Tuesday 7 September 2021. Thank you.