Spotlight on the Museum

The Flintham museum opened in 1999 and as part of our 20th anniversary celebrations we staged an exhibition in July at the Spotlight Gallery, Newark Town Hall Museum and Art Gallery. 

Our exhibition looked at how the contents of the village shop at Flintham were found buried beneath decades of dust, and how volunteers turned the muck and muddle into a museum. Details of shopkeeping before supermarkets were given and there was an insight into how the village shopkeeper was more than just a retailer.

Other aspects of the work the museum volunteers do in the community were also displayed, including our successful 1960s project for people who have dementia and their carers. Visitors with a relative or friend who has dementia were able to take home a free 'fidget muff' on request. There was a section about different types of education in Flintham over the centuries plus a game where you chose one of six First World War characters and worked out how hungry they might have been in 1918.

The cake we had at our 20th anniversary picnic was also on display. We couldn't justify the cost of having a large fruit cake made, iced and decorated so Helen, one of the museum's design team, volunteered to make a cake with a difference. She borrowed an idea from World War Two weddings and made a 'cake' from stiff card which she then decorated. Underneath the posh, pretty cover sat a proper, but very small cake. (We had made lots of other small cakes as well so everyone was able to have a slice!)