Wiltshire Heritage Museum

I'm always happy to flag up the importance of our museums -- especially those which are independent and run by charitable institutions. Those (such as the Wiltshire Heritage Museum in Devizes) are the most vulnerable -- and as somebody who is a charity trustee myself, I know what it is like to battle on in hard times, when local authority and other funding can no longer be taken for granted. Charitable funds are very hard to come by these days, and I hope that the Devizes Museum will manage to raise the money it needs to keep going. They are organizing a lecture on 31st March. Looks interesting -- please support it if you can.....


Fundraising Lecture by Lord Asa Briggs
History and its Neighbours on Saturday 31 March at 2.30pm.

Professor Lord Briggs (Asa Briggs), is perhaps the best-known living historian in Britain and he is giving this fundraising lecture for the Wiltshire Heritage Museum. He gives this description of his lecture:

Historians of all kinds are concerned with perspectives. How and why do they change? In my lecture I will draw on my own experience inside and, just as important, outside universities. I shall also draw on some of the remarkale experiences of your remarkable Society* founded in 1853. I have been as deeply interested in the relationship between local, national and global history as your Society has. I have deliberately chosen the same title for this lecture as I chose for my inaugural lecture as Professor of History at Leeds University in 1955.

Lord Briggs was formerly Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sussex and Chancellor of the Open University. He is a renowned historian and one of the most respected to write on the Victorian era.

*The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, which owns and adminsters the Wiltshire Heritage Museum, was formed in 1853.

Tickets cost just £10 and you will be helping us to continue to maintain the nationally important collections we hold. We are an independent charity and only 10% of our income comes from public funding. We face an annual deficit in excess of £50,000.

The lecture will be at Devizes Town Hall and tickets can be purchased online, or by contacting the Bookings Secretary on 01380 727369.
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Devizes MP, Claire Perry, pledges to support Museum

Devizes MP Claire Perry wrote in Thursday's Gazette ...
'Last Thursday I had the great treat of visiting the Wiltshire Heritage Museum in Devizes, which contains the best bronze age collection of artefacts in the country ... but receives public funding that is a fraction of that enjoyed by museums in London.
The museum has expansion plans that will strengthen its links with the World Heritage Sites at Stonehenge and Avebury (one of the most atmospheric places int he world) but needs to attract more funding and visitors. I have pledged to do all I can to help this gem of an institution.'

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The Wiltshire Heritage Museum has an international reputation and attracts visitors from all over the world. The archaeology collections, which are among the finest in Britain, trace the history of people living in Wiltshire in a series of galleries - Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval. The collections on display include important finds associated with the World Heritage Sites of Avebury and Stonehenge.
 

Wiltshire Heritage Museum
Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society
Company Limited by Guarantee Registered in England - no. 3885649
Registered Office: 41 Long Street, Devizes, Wiltshire. SN10 1NS
Registered Charity No. 1080096
Tel. No. 01380 727369   wanhs@wiltshireheritage.org.uk