| The Cowper and Newton Museum is an independent museum run as a
charitable trust, staffed by a Custodian and a part-time House Manager, with
volunteer help from the Friends of the Museum who work in the shop, in the
garden and with visiting groups. The Museum was opened in 1900 when Mr W. H.
Collingridge was persuaded to give Orchard Side, his house, once the home of
William Cowper, the eighteenth century poet, letter writer and classical
scholar, to Olney to be used as a museum. Margaret Nicholas, Chair of the
Friends of the Cowper and Newton Museum, Olney, Buckinghamshire, writes:
‘With the award of a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, we were able to
employ a Collections and Interpretations Officer to redisplay our collections.
Paul Baker joined us in February 2007 on a twelve-month contract and has
transformed our 108-year-old museum. His appointment followed the
Lottery-funded acquisition of the last major collection of material connected
with the poet, William Cowper, that was still in private hands. By coincidence,
2007 was also the year of the Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade
and of the death of John Newton, ex-slave trader turned abolitionist and the
Lottery provided a further grant, enabling the Museum to create a permanent
exhibition on his life and involvement with slavery. With the two grants, Paul
was able to go well beyond his original brief of redisplaying and
re-interpreting the Cowper Collection and has brought out the full potential of
the collections. The Museum now has brand-new interpretation panels, explaining
the lives and works of Cowper and Newton, audio presentations at key points in
the tour, lighting appropriate to textiles and works on paper and
state-of-the-art display cases for its most precious objects. The substantial
local history collection has been separated from the Cowper and Newton
collection and re-branded as ‘The Olney Museum’. |
