What can I say about the National Railway Museum but trains, trains, and more trains!
(There's a surprise)
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed my time spent working at the National Railway Museum. My typical day started at 9am, checking in through "Control", the security office that keeps track of who is, or isn't in the Museum. It's such a large place, with so many employees and even more volunteers, that it's really important for them to know who is there in the event of an emergency. Control is located on the far side of the building from the conservation office, so after checking in, I had a nice walk through the museum, past all of the trains, and through the "warehouse", where all of the train related artifacts are on display. The warehouse has statues, model trains, stained glass windows, signal boxes, signs, and all manner of train memorabilia. It's all displayed in clear glass cases stacked up warehouse style. It's not the most sympathetic display I've ever seen and makes photography difficult as you'll see. Here's a few of the bits that I walked past every morning. All of these were either on a train, in a train station, or in a train company office at some point in time.
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| Heraldry in Glass |
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| Stained Glass was a Staple Decoration in Train Stations |
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| Queen Victoria is everywhere! |
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| An Old Weather Vane |
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| Glass Signals |
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| Model Trains Abound! |
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| A Model of the Upminster Train. My Mum grew up in Upminster so she may have ridden on the real thing. |
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| Sofia at Platform 9 3/4 (Harry Potter) with a view of "the Warehouse" behind. |
The Mallard
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| The Mallard Coronation |
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| Hand Painted Numbering |
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| Inside the Locomotive The Hogwarts Castle    |
The Duchess of Hamilton
Queen Victoria's Saloon Carriage
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| The Keys to the Castle!! |
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Dressed in Blue Silk |
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| A Bed Fit for a Queen |
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| The Saloon
One of my long-term projects while I was at the museum was to conserve a panel of Victorian stained glass that was in storage, which originally came from the Gorton Works Boardroom of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincoln Railway. It was made in 1886. This is what it looked like before and after.
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Here are a few photos of me in action...
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| Cleaning construction dust off the tops of carriages in Station Hall |
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| Cleaning the Victorian Glass |
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| Preparing the lead for new copper ties |
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| Preparing to fix one of the Locomotives in the engineering department. |
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| Preparing historic advertising posters for storage. My favorite sign in the museum... |
So, now my placements have come to an end, and next week classes will start again. I'll be doing a module on Art and Imagery in York Minster and Cultural Heritage Mangement. My friends from the program have all returned from their placements around the globe and we are looking forward to the new term. Stayed tuned for more adventures in York!
