Lets cross that bridge when we come to it

Art   Collections & Objects   Exhibitions   South Shields Museum & Art Gallery
Posted by administrator on October 28, 2011     Permalink     Leave a comment

Our new exhibition opened on Saturday 15 October entitled ‘Crossing the Tyne’. It was all a bit touch-and-go for a while, as at first I thought we didn’t have enough items to exhibit; however, by the end of the week I was fretting that we had too much!

As Exhibitions Officer, the installation of exhibitions usually falls to me to oversee but I must admit that art exhibitions are not my speciality. I trained as an Egyptologist so 3D objects are much easier for me to get my head around when it comes to displays!

Since this year saw the opening of the second vehicular Tyne Tunnel in South Tyneside it made sense for South Shields Museum & Art Gallery to celebrate this feat of engineering in some way. Several years ago there was an exhibition at the Shipley Art Gallery in Gateshead called ‘Building Bridges’, which used many of the beautiful art works that you can see in this new exhibition. However, anyone who visited that exhibition will be pleased to know that we have added plenty of new acquisitions (including objects!) to ‘Crossing the Tyne’.

The premise of the exhibition is that it takes a closer look at the different ways and means of crossing the River Tyne- starting with the ‘Pons Aelius’ (Hadrian’s Bridge) in Newcastle upon Tyne dating to AD 122 through to the Tyne ferries and tunnels.

Last week we beavered away to get everything ready in time for the opening, and as it transpired it was not the artwork that created the biggest stumbling block, but the large, to-scale model of part of the Tyne Bridge that really stumped me (or should I say, nearly killed me). If you do go and see the exhibition, have a look at the size of the plinth that was made and you will see what I mean…

Anyway, the exhibition runs until the 28 January 2012 and we have some great people contributing to the free events programme so I genuinely hope you enjoy it. Personally, I think it looks great…

The Emperor Hadrian Landing at Pons Aelii (now Newcastle) AD 122

Trick or Treat?

Collections & Objects   Local History   Social History   South Shields Museum & Art Gallery
Posted by administrator on October 26, 2011     Permalink     Leave a comment

With Halloween fast approaching, I got to thinking about what we have in the collections at South Shields Museum to represent this spooky time of year!

I’ve recently been scanning a large collection of 35mm slides, taken by Ronald Sanderson who lived in South Shields. Ronald was a prolific amateur photographer, who liked to take pictures of his travels around the country with his wife Mabel, as well as at home in South Shields.

Among Ronald’s slides are some pictures of a small fireworks display, dated 1966. I imagine the slides were probably taken in Ronald and Mabel’s garden, or the garden of a friend; one of the fireworks is shown propped up on top of a pair of wooden stepladders!

fireworks in a garden in South Shields 1966

Garden firework photographed by Ronald Sanderson, South Shields, 1966. TWCMS : 2011.2097

fireworks in a garden in South Shields 1966

Catherine Wheel firework photographed by Ronald Sanderson, South Shields, 1966. TWCMS : 2011.2095

Firework on a stepladder in a garden in South Shields 1966

Garden firework photographed by Ronald Sanderson, South Shields, 1966. TWCMS : 2011.2098

Man holding a firework in a garden in South Shields 1966

Man holding a firework, photographed by Ronald Sanderson, South Shields, 1966. TWCMS : 2011.2102

Another photograph from the museum’s collection was taken about 20 years after the ones seen above. It shows children enjoying a Halloween party at the Gambling Man Gallery on Wapping Street, South Shields, in the mid 1980s. The kids can be seen sitting around a table, eating party food. Placed in the middle of the table is a turnip carved into a Halloween jack-o’-lantern.

Children at a Halloween party in South Shields mid 1980s

Children at a Halloween party in South Shields, mid 1980s. TWCMS : 2009.2286

I grew up in Northern Ireland at about the time this photo would have been taken, and when I was little my family always carved a turnip, rather than a pumpkin. Turnips were traditionally used in Ireland and Great Britain, until recent years when pumpkins became more readily available in supermarkets.

Have you ever carved a jack-o’-lantern from a turnip? I can tell you, from personal experience, it’s pretty hard going! I doubt anyone still bothers to carve a turnip lantern these days, but get in-touch if you do!

The last item I found squirreled in the museum store is this small children’s tinplate toy.

Halloween tinplate toy made in Japan 1970s

Halloween tinplate toy made in Japan, 1970s. TWCMS : 2010.4597

It’s a hand operated spinning Catherine wheel which produces coloured sparks when the wheel spins round (best seen in action, in the dark!). The disc on the front features two black cats. It was made in Japan about the 1970s, and was probably sold as a cheap child’s novelty from a shop like Woolworths.

In the grand scheme of things, we don’t have a lot of Halloween related items in the Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums collections; if you have anything that you’d be willing to donate, please get in-touch.

I hope you have a spooky Halloween :O

Recent developments on the ‘We Mak’em’ Sunderland Shipbuilding archives project

Collections & Objects   Discovery Museum   Local History   Maritime History   Social History   The Archives
Posted by administrator on October 24, 2011     Permalink     Comments (6)

It’s been an exciting past month on the Sunderland Shipbuilding archives project. For one thing I now have a ‘glamorous’ assistant, Colin Boyd, who will be working part-time with me for the next year. Colin has worked in the shipbuilding industry and so he brings valuable technical and historical knowledge to the project. He is already making excellent progress sorting through the large quantity of unlisted ships plans we hold for the company of Bartram and Sons Ltd.

Most of my recent work has focussed on cataloguing the records of the firm of Sir James Laing & Sons Ltd. The firm dates back to 1793 and was established by two brothers, Philip and James Laing, who moved to Sunderland from Fife, in Scotland. Our collection of Laings records is one of the largest that I will work on during the project and includes many of the oldest Sunderland shipbuilding documents we hold.

The earliest shipbuilding record we hold for Sunderland is a ships particulars book for Laings dating from 1794 to 1895 (TWAM ref. DS.LG/4/2/1). This is a fascinating volume, which includes general information about the earliest vessels built by the firm. The collection is full of such gems and includes something to appeal to everyone. For instance there’s a wage book covering the years 1800-1801 (TWAM ref. DS.LG/2/12/1). This wage book is by far the oldest shipbuilding employee record we hold for Sunderland. The names in the book will be of interest to family historians, while the information about rates of pay to foremen, carpenters, hewers, sawyers, borers and smiths should prove just as valuable for social history research.

Wage book entries dating from 1800 (TWAM ref. DS.LG/2/12/1)

I also recently discovered an early ships cost book for Laings (TWAM ref. DS.LG/4/12/1). This cost book contains interesting details of the materials and labour used in building individual ships and includes the names of firms that supplied Laings. This cost book dates back to 1857 and includes a double-page entry for one of the best known vessels built on the River Wear, the ‘Torrens’.

Cost book entry for the Torrens, 1875 (TWAM ref. DS.LG/4/12/1)

Launched in 1875, she was a composite ship of iron frame and wooden planks. The ‘Torrens’ was renowned for her speed and set a new record journey time from London to Adelaide, making the voyage in 64 days. She is also well known through her association with the novelist, Joseph Conrad, who served as an officer on the ‘Torrens’ in the early 1890s, during which time he started writing his first novel.

The collection includes many excellent series of photographs. These relate mainly to the ships built by Laings and I hope to include some of these images in a future blog, once they have been catalogued. Other subjects are covered as well, including royal visits, employees and the shipyard premises. I’m particularly keen on aerial photographs and the collection includes several excellent shots of the Deptford Yard, taken in July 1959 by the firm Turners (Photography) Ltd.  As well as showing the shipyard itself they also reveal fascinating details of the surrounding area.

Aerial photograph of Deptford Yard, Sunderland, July 1959 (TWAM ref. DS.LG/5/3/2)

All in all, it’s been a busy but very rewarding month … and that’s without mentioning a fantastic new donation of Sunderland shipbuilding records that I collected just over a week ago. I’d love to reveal more but that will have to wait till next month’s blog.

The wagons out in the open for the last time before the Wagon Shed Opens on 22 October….

Collections Management   Local History   Technology
Posted by administrator on October 20, 2011     Permalink     Leave a comment

The fit out company came on site on Monday 17th October to install the displays and interactives. In order to protect the platform edge next to the Goods Brake Van so that people can get right up to it and look in the wagons had to be taken out of the Wagon Shed. The opportunity was taken to photograph them in their restored condition on, what was an unexpectedly sunny day.

Everything is on course for the Wagon Shed to be open to the public for the first time on Saturday 22 October. We would love to see you there….

A grim death for a most heinous crime…

Local History   Social History   South Shields Museum & Art Gallery
Posted by administrator on October 18, 2011     Permalink     Comments (3)

The other week I participated in a ghost walk around Newcastle city centre and although I’m not a believer in the supernatural by any means, I was intrigued by this region’s gruesome history and wasn’t disappointed. As Exhibitions Officer at South Shields Museum I often wander past a grim reminder of South Shields’ own reminder of a macabre story involving the murder of local Town Magistrate, Nicholas Fairles in 1832.

If you visit the Changing Faces gallery within the museum you will undoubtedly come across the gibbet with the (replica) body of the miner, William Jobling. The story goes that strikes at the Jarrow Colliery over pay and working conditions had left many of the miners in dire straits and following a night on the drink, Jobling approached Fairles for some money. Having been refused this loan, Jobling and an accomplice, Ralph Armstrong, viciously beat the magistrate and left him to die. Armstrong was never caught, but Jobling was hunted down, tried and sentenced to his death with his body to then be suspended from a gibbet thereafter.

A gibbet was a frame, often made of metal, built to contain the body of a criminal and hung from a gallows for all to see. Apparently it was common for criminals to be placed inside this structure whilst alive up until the 17th century. They would have been left to slowly die and then decompose over a number of months as a stark reminder to all na’er-do-wells that this would be their punishment if caught and tried for crimes such as murder and even sheep-stealing.

Gibbeting was a form of punishment that was used alongside hanging but not everyone was in favour of this form of death penalty, especially given that rotting bodies emitted a stench that led to fears over the spread of disease!

We know of several gibbeting structures around the North East, including “Winters Gibbet” in rural Northumberland, demonstrating just how popular this punishment was. Following the passing of the 1752 Murder Act, the bodies of gibbeted criminals were often passed over to the Barber-Surgeons for dissection providing one last bit of humiliation for the criminal. However, in the case of William Jobling’s death, this was not the case. Having been placed in the gibbet (probably having been executed beforehand), his tar-covered body was supposed to have been left there in public view for a significant period of time. The addition of the tar meant that decomposition was slowed significantly and the body could be left on display for much longer.

Jobling’s body was not on public view for long however. His remains were stolen in the dead of night less than one month after he was placed there. Whilst speculation was rife that it was his family who removed his body to spare him from the fate of the Barber-Surgeons, nothing was ever proved. To this day the whereabouts of his burial place is unknown- a secret his own family took with them to their grave. However, at South Shields Museum & Art Gallery we still have part of the original gibbet structure to act as a chilling reminder of this country’s brutal practices surrounding criminal punishment between 1700s and the abolishment of gibbeting in 1834- only a few years after Jobling was hung…

Happy Halloween!

Part of William Jobling's gibbet on display