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Museum of English Rural Life

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Museum of English Rural Life
The Museum of English Rural Life garden.jpg
The Museum of English Rural Life
Museum of English Rural Life is located in Reading, Berkshire
Museum of English Rural Life
Location within Reading
Established1951
LocationReading, Berkshire, England
Coordinates51°26′55″N 0°57′40″W / 51.44868°N 0.96098°W / 51.44868; -0.96098Coordinates: 51°26′55″N 0°57′40″W / 51.44868°N 0.96098°W / 51.44868; -0.96098
TypeAgricultural museum
AccreditationArts Council England
National Archives
Websitemerl.reading.ac.uk

The Museum of English Rural Life, also known as The MERL, is a museum, library and archive dedicated to recording the changing face of farming and the countryside in England. The museum is run by the University of Reading, and is situated in Redlands Road to the rear of the institution's London Road Campus near to the centre of Reading in southern England. The location was formerly known as East Thorpe House and then St. Andrews Hall. It is an accredited museum and accredited archive as recognised by Arts Council England and the National Archives.[1][2][3][4][5]

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University of Reading

University of Reading

The University of Reading is a public university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as University College, Reading, a University of Oxford extension college. The institution received the power to grant its own degrees in 1926 by royal charter from King George V and was the only university to receive such a charter between the two world wars. The university is usually categorised as a red brick university, reflecting its original foundation in the 19th century.

London Road Campus

London Road Campus

London Road Campus of the University of Reading is the original campus of that university. It is on the London Road, immediately to the south of Reading town centre in the English county of Berkshire.

Reading, Berkshire

Reading, Berkshire

Reading is a town and borough in Berkshire, England. Located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the rivers Thames and Kennet. Reading is 40 miles (64 km) east of Swindon, 24 miles (39 km) south of Oxford, 40 miles (64 km) west of London and 16 miles (26 km) north of Basingstoke.

Arts Council England

Arts Council England

Arts Council England is an arm's length non-departmental public body of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is also a registered charity. It was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. The arts funding system in England underwent considerable reorganisation in 2002 when all of the regional arts boards were subsumed into Arts Council England and became regional offices of the national organisation.

The National Archives (United Kingdom)

The National Archives (United Kingdom)

The National Archives is a non-ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom. Its parent department is the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It is the official archive of the UK Government and for England and Wales; and "guardian of some of the nation's most iconic documents, dating back more than 1,000 years." There are separate national archives for Scotland and Northern Ireland.

History

The museum's site was originally occupied by a house known as East Thorpe, designed in 1880 by Alfred Waterhouse for Alfred Palmer (of the Reading biscuit manufacturers Huntley & Palmers). Palmer was an important early benefactor of Reading University and in 1911 East Thorpe was extended to become St Andrews Hall, a hall of residence for women attending the university.[6]

The museum itself was founded in 1951, growing out of the university's long academic connections with agriculture. The founding objects of the museum came from the collections of H. J. Massingham and Lavinia Smith. It originally occupied premises on the University of Reading's main Whiteknights Campus,[3] opening to the public in 1955. St Andrews Hall closed as a hall of residence in 2001. The site was then redeveloped for the use of the museum, with the cost of £11m being shared by the university, the Heritage Lottery Fund and public donations. The redeveloped museum opened in 2005 and retains the original East Thorpe building, with the addition of an adjoining new building. The two contrasting buildings overlook restored gardens, providing a setting for a rural collection in an urban environment.[1][3][6]

The Museum underwent a period of further redevelopment from 2013–2016, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Wellcome Trust, and the University of Reading.[7] The Museum officially reopened on 22 October 2016 with ten new galleries, including a gallery dedicated to Ladybird Books artwork held by the University of Reading Special Collections.[8]

In February 2019, a bat was found on the museum's premises. The museum named the bat MERLin and issued him a library card.[9][10]

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Alfred Waterhouse

Alfred Waterhouse

Alfred Waterhouse was an English architect, particularly associated with the Victorian Gothic Revival architecture, although he designed using other architectural styles as well. He is perhaps best known for his designs for Manchester Town Hall and the Natural History Museum in London, although he also built a wide variety of other buildings throughout the country. Besides his most famous public buildings he designed other town halls, the Manchester Assize buildings—bombed in World War II—and the adjacent Strangeways Prison. He also designed several hospitals, the most architecturally interesting being the Royal Infirmary Liverpool and University College Hospital London. He was particularly active in designing buildings for universities, including both Oxford and Cambridge but also what became Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds universities. He designed many country houses, the most important being Eaton Hall in Cheshire, largely demolished in 1961-63. He designed several bank buildings and offices for insurance companies, most notably the Prudential Assurance Company. Although not a major church designer he produced several notable churches and chapels. He was both a member of The Royal Institute of British Architects, of which he served a term as President, and a Royal Academician, acting as Treasurer for the Royal Academy.

Alfred Palmer (businessman)

Alfred Palmer (businessman)

Alfred Palmer was a member of the Palmer family, proprietors of the Huntley & Palmers biscuit manufacturers of Reading in England.

Huntley & Palmers

Huntley & Palmers

Huntley & Palmers is a British company of biscuit makers originally based in Reading, Berkshire. Formed by Joseph Huntley in 1822, the company became one of the world's first global brands and ran what was once the world’s largest biscuit factory. The biscuits were sold in elaborately decorated biscuit tins. In 1900 the company's products were sold in 172 countries, and their global reach saw their advertising posters feature scenes from around the world. Over the years, the company was also known as "J. Huntley & Son" and "Huntley & Palmer".

H. J. Massingham

H. J. Massingham

Harold John Massingham (25 March 1888 – 22 August 1952) was a prolific British writer on ruralism, matters to do with the countryside and agriculture. He was also a published poet.

Lavinia Smith

Lavinia Smith

Lavinia Dugan Smith was a teacher and museum founder in East Hendred, Oxfordshire.

Whiteknights Park

Whiteknights Park

Whiteknights Park, or the Whiteknights Campus of the University of Reading, is the principal campus of that university. The park covers the area of the manor of Earley Whiteknights, also known as Earley St Nicholas and Earley Regis.

Pound sterling

Pound sterling

Sterling is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound is the main unit of sterling, and the word "pound" is also used to refer to the British currency generally, often qualified in international contexts as the British pound or the pound sterling.

Wellcome Trust

Wellcome Trust

The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome to fund research to improve human and animal health. The aim of the Trust is to "support science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone." It had a financial endowment of £29.1 billion in 2020, making it the fourth wealthiest charitable foundation in the world. In 2012, the Wellcome Trust was described by the Financial Times as the United Kingdom's largest provider of non-governmental funding for scientific research, and one of the largest providers in the world. According to their annual report, the Wellcome Trust spent GBP £1.1Bn on charitable activities across their 2019/2020 financial year. According to the OECD, the Wellcome Trust's financing for 2019 development increased by 22% to US$327 million.

Ladybird Books

Ladybird Books

Ladybird Books is a London-based publishing company, trading as a stand-alone imprint within the Penguin Group of companies. The Ladybird imprint publishes mass-market children's books.

Collections

The Museum houses designated collections of national importance that span the full range of objects, archives, photographs, film and books. It is also the location of the University of Reading's special collections archive, housing hundreds of collections of rare books, manuscripts, typescripts and other objects of importance. The collections hold over 25,000 objects, almost all of which are on display, and which provide a material record of rural England covering 1750 to the present day. It cares for a collection of livestock portraiture, representations of rural life, agricultural hand tools, ploughs, farm machinery, sewing machines and other equipment.[1][2][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]

The museum has a specialist library and houses other collections including the library of the Tools & Trades History Society.[18]

Gallery

Source: "Museum of English Rural Life", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, February 2nd), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_English_Rural_Life.

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References
  1. ^ a b c "Doors set to open on rural museum". BBC. 30 June 2005. Retrieved 25 April 2009.
  2. ^ a b "About the Museum of English Rural Life". University of Reading. Retrieved 24 April 2009.
  3. ^ a b c "Our History – Museum of English Rural Life". University of Reading. Retrieved 24 April 2009.
  4. ^ "List of Accredited museums in the UK, Channel Islands, and Isle of Man". Arts Council England. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  5. ^ "Accredited archive services, statistics and outcomes". The National Archives. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  6. ^ a b "The History of St. Andrew's Hall – a scrapbook" (PDF). University of Reading. Retrieved 24 April 2009.
  7. ^ "Museum of English Rural Life opens after multi-million pound redevelopment". Heritage Lottery Fund. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  8. ^ "Entire art gallery of Ladybird book covers is world first". The Guardian. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  9. ^ "UK Museum Finds Cute Bat in Its Rare Book Store, Names It 'Merlin'". Geek.com. Archived from the original on 26 February 2019. Retrieved 26 February 2019.
  10. ^ "How an unlikely English museum became a viral sensation". Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 26 February 2019.
  11. ^ "University of Reading, Museum of English Rural Life". MICHAEL – The Multilingual Inventory of Cultural Heritage in Europe. Archived from the original on 27 July 2011. Retrieved 24 April 2009.
  12. ^ "Collection Overview". The Museum of English Rural Life. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  13. ^ "Museums with basketry collections". The Basketmakers' Association. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  14. ^ "Art UK". Art UK. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  15. ^ Wilson, Catherine (2011). Digging deep : report on the results of the Plough Survey. Rural Museums Network. p. 22.
  16. ^ "Barnett, James Nutcombe (sewing machine collector)". Barnett (sewing machine collector). The Museum of English Rural Life. Retrieved 9 December 2019.
  17. ^ "Michael O'Connell Wall Hanging object record". The Museum of English Rural Life online catalogue. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  18. ^ Tools & Trades History Society
External links

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