A Day in the Life of a Museum Assistant

If you’re interested in one of our Museum Assistant posts and wonder what it might entail, try giving our day in the life of a Museum Assistant a read...

‘It’s just about quarter to 10 and we’re signing in for the day, grabbing radios so that we can communicate with the rest of the staff, we take a look in the diary and see if any we have any group or school bookings. It’s a coach load of people, and they’re coming in at 11’o clock so we grab the building keys, between me and the other assistant on duty, we’ve split the site in half and he’s opening up the bottom whilst I get started on the top.

All the buildings need to be unlocked, lights turned on, and fire escapes unlocked and checked. Whilst I’m opening up, I make sure everything looks clean and tidy; grabbing some used paper that was missed yesterday and popping it in the bin. It only takes 15 minutes between us, meaning that we’ll be ready for 10 when the first visitors come in.

My colleague is down in the ‘home close’ area, that means he can greet visitors as they come through Abbot’s Hall barn, he can fill them in on any information, and he’s also updated the 'What’s on board' to let visitors know if we have anything special happening on site. The Blacksmith is in today so it’s great to let people know. 


A couple come in, and the husband has some mobility issues, so he’s offered a buggy ride when he needs it to get him up to the top of the site. On a 75 acre site, it can make a huge difference to visitors!

Time flies pretty fast, and as a Museum Assistant I’ve already talked to a few visitors who have asked me questions about the buildings and collections. There was a couple of things I was unsure of, so I apologised and promised to get back to them, I went and asked the Duty Officer whether they had any idea and luckily they did so I was very quickly able to get to the visitors and let them know!

It’s approaching 11 and the coach is coming in the gates. The Duty Officer has come out to greet the coach, and I’m helping to welcome people and distribute site maps to them as they get off the bus. Once we’ve got everyone sorted and answered a few questions, the group starts to disperse to look around the site at their leisure, they’ve requested a Watermill tour after lunch which my colleague is going to be giving.

I’m having lunch first today, so I head off to grab myself a bite to eat, in an hour’s time I’ll swap over with the other assistant and look after home close.

When I come back, I have a brief talk with my colleague; he lets me know that he’s given a buggy ride to the couple from earlier up to the Chapel and that they need to be picked up in 15 minutes. When it comes to it I get in the buggy, pick them up and have a chat with them asking them about what they’ve enjoyed, they’ve managed to see all the buildings despite the gentleman’s mobility issues and are very grateful for the use of the buggy. I take them back down to home close and drop them off at the Cafe for a spot of lunch

It’s a bit quieter in the afternoon, as my colleague does the Watermill tour, but it gives me a chance to do a bit of cleaning in Domestic Life. I give the walkthrough areas a good sweep and have a bit of de-cobweb before tidying up the children’s area. It looking good, just as another set of visitors walk through the door.

I catch some visitors on their way out, and ask them to fill in one of our Visitor survey forms, they’re a great way of knowing what the visitor has enjoyed about their day, and if there is anything we can improve on.

As half four approaches, we bid farewell to our coach-load of visitors, my colleague waves them goodbye, before heading to the very top of the site to start locking up. I won’t lock up home close until five, this gives visitors a chance to work their way back. When we reach five, and all the visitors are off the site, we can close the last few buildings before putting keys and radios away and signing out before going home.

It’s been a busy day, but it’s been great as usual. I’ve spoken to loads of visitors and answered some questions, as well as learning a few things myself.'

If you're interested in becoming a Museum Assistant, we have all the details on our Website

Christmas Craft Fayre 2011

Stowmarket is getting exciting! There's a lot happening in this town, and the recent Lights Switch On proved that, with the people of Stowmarket proving they are more than happy to embrace events that take place, with fantastic numbers of people making their way into the town centre itself, but also making their way up to us here at MEAL.

We played host to a Christmas Craft Fayre, as well as providing our annual Santa's Grotto and taking orders for Christmas trees which we sell as part of the Museum's Social Enterprise. From 12pm-7pm we saw fantastic numbers of people take a look at what Craft stallholders had to offer,  as well as be treated to a rousing performance of carols from our next door neighbours, Abbot's Hall Primary School.

Located in the barn itself, our trusty volunteers had helped us create a beautifully decorated area that had a real traditional Christmas feel. An atmosphere needed to help people get into the Christmas spirit a full month before the day itself! We had a fantastic selection of stalls, despite us not having the space to accommodate large numbers of people selling, we instead made sure we chose a diverse range of crafts that more than made up for it. With art and prints, Christmas cards and paper, jewellery, cakes (and what fabulous cakes they were!), handcrafted wooden decorations, all sorts of fabulous fabric fancies and some really superb handmade crayons that made very special childrens gifts, there really was so much to choose from.

As anyone that's familiar with the Museum knows, we're passionate about sustainability and supporting local economy. That's why we love events like this, that show off brilliant handmade items, but that also draw people into the Museum that may not be familiar with what we have, and what we do. We also really love to involve ourselves with the community, the town council did a really great job providing entertainment that kept people in the town, supporting local business.

So it's a massive thank you to all those that attended, another big thank you to the stallholders who braved the cold of the barn for over 7 hours! And an extra special thank you to Santa Claus himself, who listened to many, many childrens Christmas wish lists.

Skills for the Future at MEAL

Throughout the course of this blog, I've mentioned the Skills for the Future programme on numerous occasions. It seems only right therefore to give a bit of explanation as to what exactly Skills for the Future is, and how you could get involved in the programme.

Skills for the Future is a heritage lottery project that is funding numerous programmes within the sector, with the aim of preserving heritage skills by offering work-based training in a wide range of skills. These include looking after buildings, landscapes, habitats, species, and museum and archive collections. These skills will give all the participants a real chance at pursuing a career in heritage.

The Museum of East Anglian Life is working in partnership with Gressinghall Farm and Workhouse to provide a series of programmes over three years. I've included all the details of these programmes at the end of this post, including the latest advert for a Farrier post at Gressinghall. 

End of the Season

We've just had a smashing half-term week, which saw an exciting hunt for the Were-rabbit and a brilliant Big Read and Big Draw, though sadly these draw us to the end of our season here at the Museum. We love to go out on a high, so thanks to everyone that participated in our half-term activities, or who just paid us a visit last week. October has been very kind to us with the weather, and you've certainly all taken advantage of that with a few extra trips to the Museum! Of course it's always sad  when we close the doors, but with two events still to come, there are always ways that you can continue to support the Museum this winter.

This Saturday sees an explosive, fun-filled evening with our annual bonfire night and fireworks display. It's a truly fabulous, family event. With traction engines in steam, and a selection of Old Tyme amusements from an East Anglian fairground family, this is so much more than your average fireworks display. Gates open at 6.30pm and food and refreshments will be available throughout. Tickets are available in advance from Mid Suffolk Tourist Information, Adults £4, Children £3 and a Special Family ticket £12 (2 adults, 3 children) or you can buy your tickets on the night, Adults £4.50, Children £3.50 (no family ticket available on the night).

After the Bonfire's been put out, we start the preparations for Christmas! Headed by our Christmas Craft Fayre on the 25th November, which promises a fantastic range of quality Christmas gifts, decorations and food all within our beautiful thirteenth century barn. As well as this, Santa's grotto will also be open and we'll be taking orders for our fabulous Christmas trees. It's free to come into the Craft Fayre so it's worth checking out what's on offer! 

Santa's grotto and the Christmas trees will continue on every Sunday up until Christmas (with the exception of December 25th!), so there are plenty of reasons to come up to the Museum.

Meanwhile, we're still incredibly busy behind the scenes, as we put lots of effort into the big move into Abbots Hall, ready for opening in the new season. It's an incredibly exciting project, and I'll keep you updated right here at MEAL Blog!

A lucky tale

Here at the Museum we preserve the past in lots of different and interesting ways. We have a keen interest in the Suffolk Trinity and we always like to report on any activities of developments to do with the animals we have here on site.

So it's with great pleasure I bring you the story of a new calf here at the Museum, born last Wednesday, the first heifer calf on the ground. It's the story of a calf that nearly didn't come to be, and a very lucky mum with a lucky name to match!

The Calfs mother, is very aptly name Lucky Stripe. Aptly because Lucky was, before she came to the Museum, in the fattening pen at Downham market. Things weren't looking promising, the future was looking bleak, until a breed secretary on Dartmoor got in contact with Jeremy Perkins, who owns the herd who graze here at the Museum.

A frantic race to save Lucky was underway and after a few phonecalls to a cattle dealer, Jeremy became Lucky's hero and the deal was done to save Lucky from the butchers knife, and bring her into the herd. Despite being a black Riggit, Jeremy knew that she carried the red gene, and gave her the name Lucky Stripe because it was her Riggit markings that saved her from the chop!

Lucky Stripe and Rosy

Lucky's luck still hasn't run out, and her beautiful calf is proof of that. Named Rosy, even the new calf has an interesting story behind her name. The name Rosy was given to Jeremy by a wonderful family of visitors he encountered here at the Museum, the little girl, Kelsey having the honour of naming the calf.

Beautiful Rosy!

Rosy has been registered as Two Mills Rosy, and will go in a separate group of Red cows to be started at the Museum. Eventually she will be mated to Rugus of Hindhope, a very handsome, solid red, shaggy bear of a bull calf, brought from a Mr. Elliot at Hindhope,  Jedburgh on the Scottish borders.

Rosy and Lucky can be found on the Nature trail here at the Museum and are definitely worth a look!

Thanks to Jeremy Perkins for all the information http://twomills.weebly.com/

More trainee news

Another week, another blog from another trainee. This time it's the turn of Jed one of our Collections trainees, who's put together this piece for the Association for Suffolk Museums newsletter, which he's kindly offered to share here on the MEAL Blog. It's fantastic to share some of the day to day life of a trainee, and to highlight just how interesting and rewarding the schemes being offered here at the Museum are.

'We’ve now been at MEAL for four months and we’re amazed not only by how quickly the time has passed, but by how much we’ve already done in this short time. Over these four months we’ve attended numerous training sessions, teaching us the expected standards relating to documentation, handling, and conservation to name but three. Significantly though, this traineeship has not just been a prescribed set of training days but a flexible learning experience, and most of our time at the Museum has been spent not in meeting rooms but getting on the job experience.

Fellow trainee Laura labelling an object at the Labeling and Marking objects training

The main focus of these four months has been getting involved in the everyday management of the museum’s collections; using the cataloguing system, finding items in the stores, and adding items to the database. We’ve also been heavily involved in the museum’s HLF project, inventorying items, conducting research, and contributing to interpretation. Alongside our work in the collections, however, we’ve had the chance to get involved in the museum’s events, including the Beer Festival, On Landguard Point and the Steam and Crafts Weekend.

Jed pouring a pint at the beer festival

More recently we have begun to get training as Museum Assistants, looking after the museum’s day-to-day operations but more importantly looking after the museum’s visitors. All of this has been great experience to count towards the Cultural Heritage Venue Operations NVQ we are undertaking over the course of the year.

Visiting the V&A, who are running the NVQ programme

Overall, it’s been a busy but rewarding four months!'

Skills for the Future update

For this blog update I've recruited two of our Skills for the Future trainees to give you their opinion on the heritage skills course. It'll give you a great idea of what's happening here at the Museum, and what we're offering in terms of courses. For more information on Skills for the Future check out Skills for the Future PDF and Upcoming Posts.

Hannah and Becky hard at work!

'We are Becky and Hannah, two students on a three month heritage skills taster course here at MEAL. The course is funded through the HLF and started in July and there are 6 of us on the course in total. We thought we’d give a quick update on the first two months of our course and show you some of the photos of the activities we have been involved with.

Becky getting a helping hand from the basketry trainer

We have been able to sample a large variety of traditional skills such as Blacksmithing, Bodging (carving traditional wooden tools and implements), working with willow/basketry, traditional printing and working with heavy horses including the wonderful Suffolk Punches. As well as learning the basics of these skills we have been able to demonstrate some of them to the public visiting the museum.

Two of the gorgeous horses Hannah and Becky were lucky enough to work with 

We have also been involved with estate work including livestock management, nature conservation and clearance,  building an eco-friendly children’s play area and making scarecrows.

Fellow trainee Luke helping to put up the Scarecrows

We also learnt how to organise a museum event - the Steam and Crafts weekend, which went really well............and we are fortunate enough to have been taught to drive a Steam engine!

Fantastic Steam engine! Riding one of these is a rare opportunity

In the next couple of weeks we are going to Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse in Norfolk (who are also running the training programme) to learn more about ploughing with Suffolk punches and other interesting things.

We are really enjoying learning the different traditional skills that have shaped the culture of our country and keeping them alive for future generations. Over the next few weeks we will be thinking about how we will take this forward as part of our future careers. We’d certainly encourage other people to get involved with the Skills for the Future programme at MEAL or Gressenhall – there will be another 3 Month taster course at MEAL starting next summer and there are a number of internships available at both museums.'

Working outdoors, learning traditional skills

Hannah all geared up for Blacksmithing

The Clay oven the trainees made, produced some tasty jacket potatoes!