The working life of Museum of London

Bookings are now open for our 2012 summer training excavation at Syon Park, Hounslow. More information and booking details can be found on our website: www.museumoflondon.org.uk/syon. Kath Creed, one of our key event organisers, explains how progress has been going so far.

Back in March we hired a mechanical digger to open three trial trenches in the area of hoped for remains of Sir Richard Wynn’s house in Syon Park. Our first issue quickly arose when we realised that the remains weren’t quite where we thought they might be!

 We were hoping they would be here:

A lovely open grassed patch with lots of space for open area trenches.

Instead we quickly realised they were over a fence and here:

In a reasonably recent plantation of new trees!

Well, it’s widely known that the best archaeology is always in the most inconvenient place. Luckily our digger fit perfectly in between the rows, and Topher (Syon’s Head Gardener) explained to us that because the trees are young (and don’t have big root systems yet) he could move a few for us to fit in our trenches. Hurrah!

This April, Cityread London, funded by Arts Council England, aims to get the whole of London reading Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens through a series of events and activities. Here Cityread blogger Aoife Mannix describes her visit to the Museum of London’s Dickens and London exhibition.

‘I’ve never read any of his books you know,’ the woman in front of me is saying to her companion.

‘Oh but you have to,’ is the shocked reply, ‘the characters are just so vivid and true.’

An observation backed up by the portraits on the walls of some of Dickens’ most famous creations as we enter the exhibition. Even if you haven’t read the books, who hasn’t heard of Scrooge or Fagin or Oliver Twist? They’re so familiar it’s as if we’ve known them all our lives. 

What’s interesting to discover is how many of his characters Dickens based on Londoners he actually knew. These are people who once walked the streets of the capital, breathing its air and soaking up its unique atmosphere. Dickens’ great gift was that he knew how to make his characters come alive so that they leapt off the pages and into real life. His readers could imagine them as real human beings struggling to survive in a vast, chaotic metropolis.

Perhaps what’s most remarkable about Dickens and London is how the Museum of London has recreated the sense of being in the city Dickens wrote so much about. Huge projections display photographs of how London looked back in the 19th century. I am surrounded by the sounds of horses’ carriages, bells and ticking clocks. This soundscape helps give the illusion that I am actually walking through these tiny back alleys and winding streets. I pass the Furnival Inn watchman’s box and the door from the infamous Newgate prison. There is the huge sign from the long gone Bull and Mouth pub. I start to get a sense of why Dickens referred to London as his ‘magic lantern.’

I turn the corner into the thrills of Theatreland that Dickens loved so much. There is tinsel and glitter, old playbills, harlequins, clowns and puppets. The toy theatre model shows the delight Dickens felt as a child at all the excitement of the stage and why he dreamed of being an actor. There is also ample evidence of how much London loved to stage Dickens. Long before the musical and within months of it being published in 1838, the capital boasted three different productions of Oliver Twist. It’s also fascinating to see playbills featuring Ellen Ternan, the actress 27 years younger than Dickens that he left his wife for.

Then there are the manuscripts themselves. There’s something very touching about seeing the Mystery of Edwin Drood, the book Dickens was working on when he died. Also I find it quite reassuring to see how many corrections and scribbled rewrites there are on the original Bleak House. Even the prolific genius Dickens wasn’t above a bit of editing!  It’s particularly inspiring to see the desk where Dickens himself wrote. The famous painting of Dickens’s dream is vividly brought to life through audio visuals. It’s as if I’ve managed to step into the world of Dickens’ extraordinary imagination.

After this journey into the past, William Raban’s film ‘The Houseless Shadow’ is a beautiful and moving way to lead me out of the exhibition and into the present. It combines contemporary footage of London at night with voiceover from Dickens’ essay ‘Night Walks’ where he describes roaming the streets of the capital in the small hours. It captures how much of Dickens’ passion for London, in all its poverty and loneliness, is still as relevant today as it was then.  

Aoife Mannix is an Irish writer and poet based in the UK. She is the author of four collections of poetry and a novel. She regularly features on BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live and has been poet in residence for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Following Hilary Young’s blog post Listening for a change last week, author Harriet Salisbury talks about the discoveries she made while delving into the Museum of London’s oral history collections for her new book, The War on our Doorstep.

I am not an oral historian – or even a historian. Before I began researching material for The War on our Doorstep, my experience of oral history was limited to recording a few interviews in my student days. So for me, the Museum of London’s vast collection of tapes was a big step into the unknown.

Luckily, in the case of the Port & River collection, there was a thick file containing an information sheet for each interview, listing the topics covered. I began by picking out anything that looked promising – ‘detailed account of childhood in East End’, ‘first day of Blitz’, or in one memorable case ‘incidence of transvestism in docks’. After a while, I concluded that the women were nearly always worth a listen, that many dockers were a winning combination of the poetic and the profane, and that managerial figures could be dispiritingly dull.

What captivated me was the way oral accounts give more than one route into the past. If you want to find out how the casual system of dockworkers was organised, or what items were regularly sent to a pawnbroker, or what a doodlebug rocket was like, you will – eventually – track down or stumble across that information. But with an oral history, you get the personal context that brings the information to life. It might be a docker’s memories of fights breaking out while waiting for a day’s work; a woman recalling trips to the pawnbroker with her dead father’s suit, or a recollection of standing in a bedroom as a child, watching a V1 rocket fly past.

‘The foreman would have perhaps 30 to 40 tallies, according to the amount of work that was going, and he’d throw that amongst the men and then they used to fight and scramble for these tallies. It was bad. That would be in the morning and it would happen again at one o’clock. That was for half a day’s work. They didn’t get a full day, no guaranteed day, only what they fought for. And it was real nasty to see it. There was no friends, there was fights for half a day’s work.’
Walter Dunsford, born 1910, Carpenter, West India Dock 1920-1970 (85.593)

‘My mother had a suit – my dad was dead, but that suit still went in and out. We always laughed about that suit – he was dead but that suit went in and out of the pawnbrokers – in on Friday, out on Monday. Everything went in, including the candlesticks, but we always had the candlesticks out for Friday night. My mother would never have done without the candlesticks. She never got her wedding ring back, though – she bought another wedding ring when my sister first brought a young man in. We said, “He’ll think that you’re not married – you got six kids and not married.” So we went out and bought her a ring.’
Miss H, born 1900, Dress Machinist (2008.112)

‘I saw the first doodlebug – the first V1 over London – with my face pressed up against the glass of my bedroom window. What a stupid thing to do. This thing went over – an extraordinary sound – not like an aeroplane at all. And I could see flames coming out of the back of what I now know was the jet propulsion unit. And then the engine stopped. I yelled to my mother. “It’s coming down!” And of course it did come down, with a bang. But not anywhere near us.’
John Earl, born 1928, Surveyor with London County Council (2005.24)

When you listen to the tapes, the voices gradually people a vanished world. As your ear tunes into individual turns of phrase, exclamations, jokes and preoccupations, you get to know and enjoy a huge cast of characters. And the further you delve, the more you begin to build up a picture of a community interconnected by people’s shared experiences, defined both by their differences and what they hold in common.

I have tried to reproduce my journey – the excitement of discovery, the growing sense of the characters behind the voices, and the layering up of a portrait of a vanished East End – in my book. My second task was choose pictures to illustrate the stories, and I’ll be writing about using the Museum’s picture library next week.

The LAARC’s residency at the Museum of London has come to an end, but our object of the month continues! This month it’s the Romans and now we’re into ‘proper’ history, as with the Roman occupation of Britain we gain our earliest written accounts of London.

The LAARC holds thousands of Roman artefacts, only some of which have made it into our galleries. Many still reside in storage waiting to be rediscovered, perhaps for a new gallery display.

So what object best to exemplify Londinium? I could have selected something iconic, such as the marble head of Mithras discovered by Professor Grimes in his chance discovery of the Roman Mithraeum. It is after all one of the finest Roman marble sculptures ever excavated in all of Britain…

Or perhaps I should have selected an artefact that brings us closer to, and makes real, Roman Londoners, such as this wooden writing tablet excavated from Poultry near Bank. Inscribed into the wood, its last permeated letter records the sale of a slave girl named Fortuna. Important as singular evidence of the slave trade, but also offering a glimpse at a real Londoner (who may not have been resident in London for very long and indeed wasn’t even ‘Roman’)…

I could even have chosen a more recently excavated object and one that showcases the ability of museum conservators to bring objects ‘back to life’ after their c.2000 year entombment. This reconstructed Roman bowl of millefiori glass was recently excavated from a grave at Prescott Street, east London and was painstakingly restored. It’s one of the finest examples known outside of the eastern Roman Empire…

Instead, I’ve not even chosen an artefact at all, but have hopefully blindsided you all by selecting an ecofact! I’ve chosen this as it highlights an important field of archaeological study – environmental archaeology – that forms a dedicated section in our Archaeological Archive. Additionally I hope this specimen illustrates how archaeology can in fact question our assumptions of written history…

Object 3

Roman (C1^st AD) Carbonised Cereal Grain

These seeds are a sample of a larger deposit of grain that was excavated from a building in London’s Roman forum – essentially the marketplace of the Roman town – in 1976. The seeds have survived through carbonisation as a result of intense burning. The impetus of this particular fire is the well known: the Boudican sacking of Londinium in 60-61 AD. As such, these seeds form part of an important ‘event horizon’ in London’s archaeological stratigraphy. Such tangible contexts are key benchmarks that allow us to construct a basic chronology and formulate a historical narrative of the early city.

Analysis of this grain deposit revealed inclusions of einkorn, lentils and bitter vetch (as well as a couple of weevils!) which has led to the conclusion that this crop was not indigenously cultivated i.e. it was imported from the Mediterranean or near east. When excavated in 1976, these seeds were the first evidence of grain being imported into Britain. Up until then it had been assumed that grain was one of the main exports of Britain, based on the writings of the Roman author Strabo: “It [Britain] bears grain, cattle, gold, silver, and iron. These things, accordingly, are exported from the island, as also hides, and slaves, and dogs…” (Geographica 4.5.199). Although this cereal may not have been imported in any major quantity, it does emphasise the importance of archaeology in the appraisal of literary texts, which can often go unchallenged.

Since the 1970s, when professional archaeology was developing in the city of London, archaeobotany has continued to evolve and our knowledge of exotic imports has considerably grown. Recent discoveries at Poultry include evidence of mulberry, pine nut, pomegranate, black cumin and anise to name a few. Although this ‘object’ may not even be recognisably Roman, its selection hopefully underpins and does justice to Londinium’s legacy as a major commercial centre.

It’s been a month since a very busy February half term, and although everyone is back to school, there is no let-down in our work as Visitor Services Hosts.

The Dickens and London exhibition is proving to be extremely popular and with just three months to go until it runs its course in June, tickets are still high in demand. To avoid disappointment and make use of our advance ticket discount, book your tickets at least one day in advance!

Remember, admission to the Museum of London and the permanent galleries are free, and so are all our Host-led activities such as our daily gallery tours, as well as interesting, on-the-spot short talks on objects within our collections.

Our free gallery tours are every day at 11am, 12pm, 3pm and 4pm and last approximately 45 minutes – perfect if you are in the City and looking for something to do during your lunch break!

From ancient archaeological artefacts discovered on the Thames foreshores to Roman Londinium and Anglo-Saxon Lundenwich, and from the Great Fire and Newgate Prison to the Victorian shops, Suffragettes and the Poll Tax Riots, the tours will leave you with knowledge and a new-found passion for this World City that is London.

If you don’t have time to join one of our tours, you don’t have to miss out! Every day we offer short, 10 minute talks on some of the most interesting objects within our galleries. You can also support the museum by purchasing a Museum Higlights book for £5. This is not only a great souvenir but also excellent accompaniment to your visit to our Museum.

At the Museum of London, we strive very hard to make our collections accessible to everyone, and have therefore started to offer tours to visually impaired visitors. Should you know someone who could benefit from one of our VisualEyes tours, please call the Museum of London box office on 020 7001 9844 to arrange a free tour.

Giusy

Our Collections online team reveal the latest group of Henry Grant photographs to be released online, including images of protest and of working life in the Capital in the 1950s.

Annual rally of the National Federation of Old Pensioners Association

On 11th November 1954, the annual rally of the National Federation of Old Pensioners Association, was held at the Central Methodist Hall. The Guardian newspaper interestingly wrote a rather derogatory report stating that there were more women than men at the meeting “among them very old ones; and true that there were cups of tea continually being sipped and bars of ice cream sucked and a lot of deaf-aids being twiddled.”

Club Row Market

Club Row was the only weekly animal street market in London during the 1950s. Every Sunday morning traders would bring hundreds of dogs and puppies to Club Row, off Bethnal Green Road where they were sold. From 1951 all animal sellers were required to hold licences however there were of course many disreputable traders. In 1982 the local council banned the sale of animals in Club Row Market.

Demonstrators at the eviction of a tenant

In May 1959 the Conservative Council in St Pancras introduced a new means tested rate scheme which increased rents dramatically for the majority of tenants, most were doubled and some even tripled. 35 separate tenants associations were set up and there were regular protest meetings, rallies and demonstrations. As many as 8,000 tenants withheld their rent in protest. This photograph depicts demonstrators at the eviction of tenant Don Cooke who had withheld his rent in protest.

Policemen in the canal

By the 1960s there were only a small number of boats using the London canals for trade and by the 1970s the use of canals for leisure had begun. A large crowd has gathered to watch police divers search the canal; unfortunately Henry Grant hasn’t left any notes about this photograph so we don’t know why they were in the water or where exactly they were.

Peace Rally

Protestors in Trafalgar Square on the final day of the Aldermaston Peace March in 1960. The marches were anti nuclear weapons protests taking place on Easter weekend which took the form of a march from the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston to Trafalgar Square in London. As can be seen from this photograph the marches were attended by thousands of people.

You know that feeling you get when you’re reading a really good book and you know there’s only a few pages left, but you’ve really enjoyed it and part of you doesn’t want the book to end, but part of you wants to know the ending. Well, that’s a bit like how I’m feeling as I write this blog.

Our Visitor Inclusion Project is coming to a close. For 29 days over the past three months, our volunteers have been engaging visitors with archaeology whilst improving the standards of our archaeological collections. And it’s been excellent. However, these projects don’t just happen just like that. Behind the scenes, loads of different people across many departments of the museum have helped create this project. So lets get those credits rolling:

The project first began 9 months ago when we checked out whether we could run our Visitor Inclusion Project in the Archaeology in Action exhibition. The project managers in our Programmes department gave the go ahead and those nice box office people helped us book the spaces.

The museum’s collections care manager was then contacted and allocated us some storage space for our project so that we could keep our equipment and boxes of archaeology safe and secure and then we needed to sort out some way of transporting all the material from our archive in Shoreditch to the Barbican site.

Our amazing van driver Tim Ellis sorted this out. We booked him in for every Thursday of the project and he has been helping us go back and forth with around 40 boxes of archaeology each week. Our archive’s security guard, Sami, along with Tim also help us load up the van each Thursday – both are top blokes! Thanks!

We then wanted to create some publicity. Our museum designers in the Design department came up with some great banners that we’ve had on display throughout the project, our Event officers allowed us to be part of their programme and publicised us in their promotional material and our Press & Marketing officers have done a sterling job getting our events onto various web site listings and publications such as Time Out. They also helped promote aspects of our project on Twitter and Facebook – much appreciated guys. Thanks!

Then there’s the technical stuff – we’re still grateful to our technicians who made our incredible table way back during our first Visitor Inclusion Project. For this project we’re also grateful to the electricians and AV folk who assisted us in getting some extra cabling in the space so our light boxes and AV stuff could work.

Thanks should also go to our Finance Officers who dutifully assist us each day in reimbursing our volunteers with their travel expenses.

And we definitely have to mention our Visitor Services department, who not only happily make announcements advertising our workshops each day, but very kindly let us borrow their Ipad for the three months to help explain our objects to visitors.

Special thanks should go to the Conservation Department intern, Jill Saunders, who not only has been explaining conservation techniques to visitors for the past 10 Mondays, but organised the help of her fellow UCL students, scheduling them in and making them feel welcome each week. Along with Jill several members of the conservation department have also lent a hand during the project so thanks to them too.

A massive thanks to Andy & Chris who have manned our Osteology table on Tuesdays. Between the pair of them they have engaged with thousands of visitors and are just brilliant. Thanks too to the museum osteologists for letting us use their collections.

And an enormous thanks to Alan Thompson, who came out of retirement, to return to his former employers and his former excavation – GPO75. It has been truly a pleasure to have had Alan join us during this project. Huge thanks to his wife, Jan, also, who has been conducting Exit Questionnaires with visitors each week.

It goes without saying that I want to thank my fellow LAARC staff for taking time out of their busy work programmes to join in during this Volunteer Inclusion Project, sharing their expertise and providing support for our volunteers. Which leads me nicely on to…

A big big big THANK YOU has to go to our excellent VIP10 volunteer team; Benji, Braena, Carl, Carol, Graham, Jim, Jon, Katerina, Margo, Maria,  Pam, Sunny,& Yulia. Not only have they done a superb job in presenting archaeology to visitors, they’ve improved the packaging of over 200 boxes of archaeology. But most importantly, they have been outstanding ambassadors for the museum and for volunteering.

Finally, a huge Thank You to the thousands upon thousands of visitors, of all ages and from all over the world that have stopped by our tables and chatted to our volunteers. Special thanks should go to the numerous visitors that have partaken in our Hands-On Archaeology workshops and helped contribute to the upkeep of our collections.

And that’s almost it. Only Friday left…