You may have noticed that Stour, one of our historic narrow boats, has been removed from our canal.
She has been lifted safely from the water so that we can better understand what her conservation requirements are.
She will be returned to the Museum shortly.
On Saturday evening, the period frying range in Hobbs’ and Sons Fish & Chip Shop unfortunately experienced a small internal fire. There were no injuries to colleagues or visitors and the Museum remained open while it was swiftly dealt with by the fire brigade.
Thank you to everyone working on the day for the professional management of the situation and the care of our visitors, as well as the ownership taken by colleagues in ensuring Saturday evening’s Peaky Blinders Night was delivered smoothly – including an alternate food offer served from within Hobbs’ itself.
We take safety seriously. After a similar incident during the summer holidays, we undertook extensive work to repair the range and obtain the relevant sign off from specialist range engineers before opening again.
While we assesses the long-term options regarding the fryer and take professional advice, the range will not be used, however Hobbs’ as a trading unit will be able to continue to operate for visitors.
Santa Hunts
Date(s):
Tickets available throughout the day: Saturday 25 November, Thursday 21 December and Friday 22 December
Afternoon timeslots only; Sunday 26 November
Limited availability (1 Adult & 1 Child Places only). Saturday 2 December, Sunday 10 December, Saturday 16 December, Sunday 17 December, Saturday 23 December and Sunday 24 December
Event Information:
An event for all the family, where visitors can work together to help Santa start Christmas Time in the Black Country by finding magic clocks around the museum.
We all know that Santa uses special time magic to travel all around the world in one night. That magic is called “Christmas Time”. Santa uses special magical clocks, all around the world, that tick with Christmas Time. Today, we need to get Christmas Time started in the Black Country! So, Santa needs your help to find and START the four magical clocks that represent each borough of the Black Country.
Along the way, you will meet Christmassy Characters who are all preparing for Christmas – help them to start the clocks and they’ll help you find the main man himself!
Internal information:
Programming lead: Jozey Grae
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We still have a few places left for this opportunity to share your knowledge and develop your skills in visitor engagement.
This work builds on the work of the 2022 cohort and the work we have been doing throughout Forging Ahead to better understand and improve our engagement with visitors. Up to 10 people will work with Black Country Touring, for approximately 2 weeks w/c 27th November.
We are looking for a range of people with diverse experience, whilst working at BCLM and/or elsewhere. We are asking participants to bring their thoughts, opinions and insight to the table. We are not looking for a group who might consider themselves “performers”, “actors” or who are looking to be trained in these areas, but rather people who have a common goal in wanting to develop and harness the strengths of the Historic Character team. We would especially like to hear from people interested in a creative and collaborative process, visitor focused and are passionate about telling the stories of the Black Country.
You will be…
If you would like further information, please look here. If you have any questions get in touch with Izzy Taylor [email protected]
If you are interested in taking part in the next cohort to share and develop your engagement skills, please read below and complete the short Expression of Interest form by midday Monday 20th November.
We are happy to share that staff tickets for the Museum’s Peaky Blinders Nights this Friday 17th and Saturday 18th November can be purchased from the Ticketing office at a discounted price of £10 per person.
If you have any questions, or wish to order tickets, please visit our Ticketing team in the Canalside office.
Do you have rampant ivy or holly that needs pruning?
Do you have excess Christmas/ fir tree cuttings?
Or do you have other evergreen materials you can spare?
To support the workshops on Tuesday 14th November and Wednesday 15th November where we will be making decorations for the site – we need masses of lovely fresh seasonal greenery. If you have a garden, an allotment or access to any lush Christmassy greenery – don’t get snipping just yet.
We’d love you to bring in whatever you have, the deadline is Monday 13th November!
If you have an allotment, it might be worth putting the call out to other plot holders – as we can never have too much!
There will be buckets for you to pop the stems in to keep them nice and fresh at the compound at the top of site. The fresher the better so if you can leave it as late as possible to cut them and put it in water straight after cutting, we can make sure our wreaths, garlands and table decorations are as fresh and perky as possible for the festive season.
Did you know the longest lasting and most festive of the greenery is beech, oak, rose hips, pine, old man’s beard, spruce, conifer, holly, ivy, fir, magnolia, hops and rosemary? We also welcome any pine cones or other festive finds. What a good excuse for a ramble in the woods!
During the festive period, once buildings are decorated, if you are working in historic buildings and you are looking for greenery to refresh your building, please contact the Collections team. If you have any questions about decorating the buildings for Christmas, please speak to the Collections team or email [email protected].
Remembrance Day & Armistice Day
Date: Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th November
Internal Information:
On Saturday there will be a simple marking of the minutes silence at 11 am. Historic characters will ring a bell in the new High Street and The Village to inform visitors that we are pausing to pay respects at 11 am. Characters in buildings are invited to stand on their door step and join the visitors in the silence.
On Sunday we shall mark the Remembrance with readings in front of the chapel in the village; this will being at 10.50 am with poems, there will be a recording of the last post and reveille either side of the silence, culminating in the final poem about the war horses. Our historic characters will lay a red poppy wreath; Danny will be present and Michelle will have a purple wreath in memory of the animals of war. Again historic characters and visitors are asked to join us for the occasion.
Programming lead: Sheila Chamberlain-Hyett
As part of our ongoing commitment to improving the visitor experience, we are about to launch a second cohort of character development work with historic characters.
This work builds on the work of the 2022 cohort and the work we have been doing throughout Forging Ahead to better understand and improve our engagement with visitors. Up to 10 people will work with Black Country Touring, for approximately 2 weeks w/c 27th November.
We are looking for a range of people with diverse experience, whilst working at BCLM and/or elsewhere. We are asking participants to bring their thoughts, opinions and insight to the table. We are not looking for a group who might consider themselves “performers”, “actors” or who are looking to be trained in these areas, but rather people who have a common goal in wanting to develop and harness the strengths of the Historic Character team. We would especially like to hear from people interested in a creative and collaborative process, visitor focused and are passionate about telling the stories of the Black Country.
You will be…
If you would like further information, please look here. If you have any questions get in touch with Izzy Taylor [email protected]
If you are interested in taking part in the next cohort to share and develop your engagement skills, please read below and complete the short Expression of Interest form by no later than Sunday 12th November.
Thank you to everyone who attended our Eighties Bostin’ Bash last night – what a success!
If you would like to share any feedback, please complete our survey.
A big congratulations to Demi Whitehouse, voted ‘Best Dressed’ as E.T!
For this month’s safety notice, we are focusing on Incident Reporting and what to do in the case of an emergency.
If any incident occurs on site, please follow these steps:
Please read the Incident Reporting thoroughly.
If you have any concerns, please contact your Line Manager.
Thank you.
