Grant awarded for construction of Victorian post office
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The BPMA have joined forces with The Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust to
build a replica late Victorian sub-post office at Blists Hill Victorian
Town. The grant, provided jointly by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and the Wolfson Foundation, will help fund the project which is expected to be completed by spring 2009.
This is an exciting new development, which will give an insight into the role of a post office in a small Victorian community. The replica post office is to be set on Canal Street in Ironbridge's Blists Hill Victorian Town.
The downstairs of the building will consist of a post office shop with traditional postal functions such as a working telegraph machine and a hands-on sorting office. The upstairs will feature a fascinating exhibition, devised by the BPMA. This will feature artefacts from our extensive collection, outlining the history of the Post Office and its important role in the community. The exhibition will, among other things, look at the change in services provided by the Post Office through the years and the different ways in which mail has been delivered.
About the grant
Altogether, thirty museums and galleries in England will benefit from grants of a total of £4 million. This year's recipients also include Ipswich Museum and Imperial War Museum.
This is the seventh year of the current DCMS/Wolfson Foundation Museums & Galleries Improvement Fund, which has awarded a total of £24 million to institutions around the country since it was set up in 2002.
About Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust
The Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust was established in 1967 to preserve and interpret the remains of the Industrial Revolution in the six square miles of Ironbridge Gorge. The Blist Hill Victorian town is one of ten award-winning Ironbridge Gorge museums, all set in the World Heritage site in Shropshire. It is a popular visitor attraction consisting of original and reconstructed buildings from the Victorian and Edwardian period, each occupied by a business from the period.