GENERAL NEWS - 1
Chairman Retires
The Friends of the Horniman
The Friends of the Horniman – and the Museum – are very sad that Margaret Spooner, a long-standing supporter of BAFM, is retiring as Chairman of the Friends at the AGM in June, 2010, for a well-earned rest. Margaret’s association with the Friends goes back to the 1988 Steering Committee.
Margaret and her late husband Philip were founder members of the Friends, who held their first event in 1988, exactly 100 years after Frederic Horniman opened his house for the first time to the public and then went on to found the Museum in 1901.
Margaret has always been an extremely active and enthusiastic member of the committee of the Friends. She has held various positions, Chair, Vice-Chair and Newsletter Editor among them. She has organised many of the big fund-raising events over the years, including the highly successful Plant Sale Plus and Carol Concert, in association with the Gardens Manager, as well as helping other committee members with events such as Mini-Glyndebournes and the Annual Art Exhibition. With the keen support of the committee, she has thus been responsible for helping the Friends raise approximately £200,000 to date.
She will also be missed for her end-of-year parties and her wonderful summer pudding.
A Tribute from the Director: Janet Vitmayer
Margaret has been a wonderful and supportive ‘Friend’ and colleague to the three Directors that she worked alongside. Her wisdom, humour and dedication to the work of the Horniman provided support through the ups and downs of Museum life. The Museum and Gardens have much to thank Margaret for – above all perhaps, we must thank her for the warmth and closeness of the working relationship that has flourished over the last 20 years, between the Horniman and its Friends.
Honour for BAFM Volunteer
MBE for Ann Heeley
Among those honoured recently by Her Majesty The Queen, was Ann Heeley, volunteer and researcher at the Somerset Rural life Museum in Glastonbury for over three decades. She is a well-known local historian and, at present, is working with others on a forthcoming book on the project with which she has been so closely involved over so many years.
For some considerable time a team of volunteers has been working on the collection of oral archive recordings, now digitised, thanks to a grant from the HLF in 2005. Ann has worked as an interviewer, talking to Somerset people about their lives and occupations and helping to build up the collection of recordings and throwing light on local industries, such as cider-making, farming and agriculture generally, willow crafts, thatching and many trades such as coopering and peat-cutting that no longer exist.
Ann said that she was ‘overwhelmed’ when she discovered that she had been awarded an MBE. “I was very touched that somebody had thought that the work with the oral archive had been recognised and very pleased for the museum to have the publicity,” she said.
In addition to her work for the Museum, however, Ann also gave much of her time to BAFM, having been an Area Co-ordinator, Editor of the then BAFM Newsletter, Committee member and Honorary Secretary of BAFM. She has worked long and tirelessly for our organisation and we of BAFM congratulate her and rejoice in her honour.
MBE For Manchester Friend
Recognition for Joan Phillips’ work for MOSI
A Founder Member of the Friends’ group of the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) who has worked for the charity for 27 years as Friend, volunteer and on the executive committee, was awarded the MBE in the New Year’s Honours List. When Joan Phillips saw that there was to be a meeting to discuss plans to open a museum in the historic Liverpool Road Station and thus to preserve the buildings, she went along, listened to the arguments, became involved and the rest is history.
The Museum opened in 1983 and, from then on, Joan worked there in various capacities, as well as taking a leading role in building up the Friends (from 1982), acting as their Secretary between 1982 and 2007 and taking the roles of Membership Secretary and Magazine Editor, posts which she still holds today. Her many other duties even included working on the railway!
The MOSI Director, Steve Davies MBE, said, “If it hadn’t been for the foresight and determination of Friends like Mrs Phillips, MOSI would not exist today and our collections related to Manchester’s role in the transport and industrial revolutions would not be accessible to millions of people. Joan is the embodiment of the volunteering ethos which the museum community so heavily relies on and she is deserving of formal recognition. She has demonstrated diligence and commitment beyond the call of duty, showing a level of attention to detail normally associated with a paid professional.”
Joan has been a loyal supporter of BAFM for many years and is well known to our members, attending both Area and National Conferences. We in BAFM offer her our heartfelt congratulations on her justly deserved honour.
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