National Museums Liverpool Blog - Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Hello there

Well I am pleased to announce my return to the world of blogging. The last time I wrote a blog post was way back in October. So what have I been doing since then? Well the answer is plenty!  First if all let me give you an update about the museum. We have had a fantastic response to the museum, from the public, museum professionals, academics and most importantly the local community. To date we have had upwards of 210,000 visitors. This is higher than we expected and we will hopefully exceed our annual forecast. We realise that there is still much work to do but in a way there always should be for a museum.  We aim to be receptive to ideas, comments and indeed criticisms but we truly believe we are a living and breathing museum and as such updating; revising and changing information as well as views and theories is part of that process.

Quite a lot of my time has been spent on putting together various strategies and policies for the museum.  This means that I have been having regular meetings with colleagues from various departments, as well as Angela Robinson - the curator of transatlantic slavery who is the person who looks after the museum collections. Angela quite rightly gets mad when I am sometimes referred to as the curator of the museum in the newspaper or on radio. But I always bring her a small present back from my travels to stay in her good books!

One of those policies is our new collecting policy. Not only do we aim to keep collecting archives and ephemera which relate to transatlantic slavery but we are looking to expand our collections into new areas. For instance, we already have in the museum a number of African American objects, what are often called ‘Black Americana’, objects such as prints, books, toys, games, ornaments or various household memorabilia, often produced from the 1920s through the 1950s in America. Some of these are on display in the Legacy gallery at the museum. Many of these objects depict racist stereotypical images and can be extremely offensive in their nature. We feel it is important though to highlight how these objects and images were used, and indeed tolerated, in popular recent culture.   

What we are now looking to do is increase our Black British memorabilia collections.  Again, some of these objects are very disturbing but we also aim to collect uplifting aspects of Black British life. If someone has an object that they feel we would be interested in please contact us here at the International Slavery Museum.

Another policy we have been developing is our international policy. As an internationally recognized museum we understand the need for us to build collaborations with a number of different countries, especially those who, like Britain, played a central role in transatlantic slavery. As part of this policy I was recently in Guyana for the Commonwealth Association of Museums conference on ‘Museums and Diversity’. I gave a paper titled ‘The International Slavery Museum: an active campaigner’. I wanted to draw attention in the paper not only to the fact that we want to work with museums in other countries, but how I see the museum as actively campaigning against contemporary forms of racism and discrimination as well as forms of contemporary slavery and bonded labour. This makes us an active museum, not a neutral one, and I challenge those that think we should be.

I also got to meet Dr Frank Anthony - the Minister for Culture, Youth and Sport. We talked about ways that we could link with museum and heritage institutions in Guyana, a country which we mention many times in the International Slavery Museum but which until 1966 was called British Guiana. There are many links between Liverpool and Guyana. One of them being that the family of four times Prime Minister William Gladstone owned a plantation near a town called Vreed-en-Hoop in a region of British Guiana called Demerara, a word which is now synonymous with brown sugar around the world. It was a very positive meeting and from it came an official invitation to participate in CARIFESTA.  We even managed to make the national press. The picture is probably the worst ever taken of me though!

Along with other delegates of the conference I managed to visit Iwokrama, a rainforest conservation and development centre. It aims to show how tropical forests can be conserved and sustained providing social, ecological and economic benefits to communities locally and indeed internationally.

On the second day we were told we would be going on a short hike up a very small mountain.  Alarm bells began to ring at the mention of the word mountain. Anyway, 2 hours and a lot of puffing and panting later I reached the top of Turtle Mountain. It was well worth the effort with beautiful views of pristine rainforest and the Essequibo River.

So I am pleased to say that the museum is a great success and there are some very exciting, as well as challenging, times ahead.  Thanks again to all of you who have visited the museum, and for those who have not had the chance, I hope you can make it soon.  Watch this space.

Have you ever had one of those afternoons when you want to see some artwork, network with some artists, listen to some performances of poetry and music, maybe join in for a bit of a sing-along yourself, or maybe even listen to a talk about some Liverpool artists but you just can't decide which one to do? I bet it happens to you all the time.

Well the good news is that this weekend you don't need to choose if you go to the Face of the City showcase event at Merseyside Maritime Museum, which features all these things and more.

The free afternoon of fun takes place this Saturday, 17 May, from 1-4pm at the museum's dockside gallery. Have a look at the Maritime Museum What's On page for further details and times of performances.

I remember the Prince’s Landing Stage at Liverpool as a constantly busy place when I was a boy in the 1950s – and the Empress of France was one of the monarchs of the sea attended by hundreds of passengers and crew.

This magnificent liner started as a Duchess before serving as a troopship in the Second World War and – after sinking a German U-boat and shooting down an enemy plane – was created an Empress.

The 20,448-ton Duchess of Bedford, of the Canadian Pacific Line, was a popular ship on the Liverpool to Canada run and she was renamed Empress of France in 1947.

She was a floating world of contrasts when first built in 1928. In those days the Duchess of Bedford could carry up to 1,570 passengers. It could take an army of some 70 waiters, 80 stewards and stewardesses, six chefs and 50 kitchen staff just to feed them. The crew numbered 510 in all, including the deck and engine room staff.

Conditions for crew members were basic, with no recreational facilities or dining rooms. Kitchen staff ate on the worktops and shared accommodation with up to 19 others in steel bunks. They had to travel light because each only had an 18-inch square locker for all their belongings.

However, for her passengers she set new standards of comfort when she began life as one of four Duchesses sailing out of Liverpool.

The Duchess of Bedford had hot and cold running water for all 580 cabin class, 480 tourist class and 510 third class passengers. This was at a time when many British homes had only a cold tap and did not have constant hot running water.

Requisitioned as a troopship, she carried a mammoth 179,000 personnel and covered more than 400,000 miles during her war service.

The Duchess of Bedford was sailing from Liverpool to Boston in August 1942 when she spotted a U-boat and sank the submarine by gunfire. She was later used in the north Africa landings in November 1943 when she shot down an enemy aircraft.

At Merseyside Maritime Museum there is a large model of the liner when she was the Empress of France, shown in her post-war livery.

Resuming her Liverpool – Quebec – Montreal sailings in September 1948, she did 310 round voyages across the north Atlantic before her final crossing in 1960.

A photograph shows the 582-ft long Empress leaving Liverpool for the last time, heading for Newport, Monmouthshire, where she was scrapped.

Merseyside Maritime Museum is open seven days a week, admission free. A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo.

Image courtesy of the Liverpool Daily Post & Echo.

Leslie and Clifford Morgan

Danger lurks everywhere and it is essential to keep vigilant at all times. This painful lesson was literally driven home to me recently when I was knocked off my bicycle – flying 10 ft into the air, fortunately without serious injury.

Birkenhead-born Leslie Morton, aged 18, has a unique place in history for using his eyes. He was the lookout who first spotted the torpedo which sank the Lusitania as she headed for Liverpool on 7 May 1915. It was just after lunchtime on a bright, sunny day and the sea was calm when the German submarine U-20 launched its deadly attack.

As the great ship passed the lighthouse at the Old Head of Kinsale, southern Ireland, Leslie was stationed on the bow of the liner. Suddenly, he spotted thin lines of foam racing towards the ship and shouted: “Torpedoes coming in on the starboard”.  A large explosion shook the Cunard vessel as the torpedo blew a large hole in her right side. The Lusitania began to sink very rapidly at the bow and within 18 minutes she was on the bottom of the Irish Sea. A total of 1,195 people died in the tragedy.

Lusitania is featured in a permanent exhibition at the Merseyside Maritime Museum called Titanic, Lusitania and the Forgotten Empress – the latter being the Empress of Ireland which sank in Canada in 1914. There is a section devoted to Leslie Morton and his brother Clifford, who was nearly 19 at the time of the disaster (they were not twins). 

Both brothers saved many lives and Leslie was later considered to be the “outstanding hero of the Lusitania disaster”.

They joined the crew of the Lusitania as ordinary seamen in New York. The brothers were among eight crew from the Liverpool sailing ship Naiad who jumped ship to join Lusitania. All planned to join the Royal Navy once they returned to England. The Morton brothers were the only ones to survive the sinking.

On display is the silver Board of Trade Gallantry Medal awarded to Leslie Morton for saving lives at sea.

Kapitan-lieutenant Walter Schwieger was the captain of the U-boat which sank the Lusitania. He was very successful, sinking three ships in two days before scuppering the Lusitania.

The sinking of the Lusitania sparked riots and attacks on businesses run by people of German descent in Liverpool and elsewhere. My late father, George Guy, as a four-year-old clearly remembered a mob attacking Yagg’s shop in Everton.

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo.

More from Reyahn King and the judging of the 25th John Moores prize.

After what can only be described as an excitable breakfast, the jurors got going this morning in great good humour. They have reached a remarkable degree of agreement about what they are looking for. Their approach is to look not just for good paintings but for paintings that have a sense of “time and place” – in other words, that have taken on board the history of art and painting, that are intellectually up to date.  And they have  great enthusiasm for originality and unpredictability in works. At least twice today their comments made me look again, harder, at works the subtlety or cleverness of which I had initially missed. I think by the time they’d gone through all the entries, there was only one of the around 150 they have selected to go to the next stage that I would disagree with – I’ll never reveal which!

Watch this space for stage 2 when we get together with the actual works in Liverpool! I for one am really looking forward to June!

Vikky Evans-Hubbard plays the role of Diane Nash

As usual our museums are packed with things to keep you busy this bank holiday weekend, but a new performance at the International Slavery Museum on Monday 5 May is definitely worth a special trip.

Keep your eyes on the prize tells the inspiring story of Diane Nash and her involvement in the civil rights movement in America during the 1960s. There are two performances at 2 and 3pm.

Or if like me you are planning a very lazy long weekend then let BBC's Woman's Hour bring highlights of the performance to you. They are doing a series on the treasures of National Museums Liverpool as picked by female members of staff. Watch this space for the others to follow throughout 2008.

Director of art galleries, Reyahn King, is in London at the moment, presiding over the judging of the 25th John Moores Contemporary Painting Prize. Here's her report from the end of day one (yesterday).

Dinos (left) and Jake Chapman. Image courtesy Mike Marsland Photos

Today, 1 May 2008, the John Moores Contemporary Painting Prize jurors started stage 1 of judging the exhibition and prize. The jurors are artists Jake and Dinos Chapman (shown), Paul Morrison, Graham Crowley and critic Sacha Craddock. Jake and Dinos are in the midst of preparing for a big show, Paul Morrison's work is on currently in lots of places including Liverpool, London and Japan, Graham Crowley has been on the news commenting on the state of art teaching in London and Sacha Craddock is a legend for her longstanding reputation as a critic and Chair of another competition, New Contemporaries. Given all this it is wonderful to me that these five will come together to spend two days in a darkened room selecting work for our exhibition in Liverpool.

At the beginning of the day over breakfast I stressed the sheer volume of art to see. With 3,448 entries I was worried that the process might run beyond the two long days everyone had set aside. Judging started at 9:30am and went on to 7pm with food breaks. Incredibly we finished ahead of schedule - the jurors were really keen, taking only short breaks before itching to get back to it.

My role is to keep the jury on schedule and coordinate with the technical team. In the main this means checking that all five jurors have agreed whether a work is to be selected or are they still pondering? Yesterday they were focused on a first sift, and if any one person liked a work it got put to one side without much debate. Already though you can see preferences for kinds of work emerging and I expect debate to really get going when we revisit the first sift.

Today we'll finish looking at all the entries and then go back to all those put on one side and reconsider them.

By the end of tomorrow, 2 May, we need to have decided which 250 or so artists will be invited to send their work to Liverpool to be judged at stage 2 in June. Watch this space!  

Our trading arm, NML Trading, is holding a Recruitment Open Day on Saturday 10th May. They're looking to recruit Team Leaders, Catering Assistants, Venue Supervisors, Chefs and Banqueting staff. They're looking for people who are passionate about catering for their daytime operation plus occasional evening work. You'll be working in Liverpool’s world class museums, providing high quality food and refreshments to over two million visitors each year.

To find out more about the roles on offer, bring your CV to World Museum Liverpool, William Brown Street, Liverpool between 10.30am and 4.30pm.

On this day in 1915 the Lusitania left New York on what would be her last voyage across the Atlantic. As the liner approached southern Ireland on 7 May 1915 she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-20. She sank in under twenty minutes with the loss of 1,201 of the 1,962 people on board.

To commemorate the tragedy the Merseyside Maritime Museum have added a lifebuoy (or ring lifebelt) from the liner to the displays in the Titanic, Lusitania  and the Forgotten Empress gallery.

The lifebuoy was found by the skipper of a fishing boat from Kinsale who helped to rescue Lusitania survivors. He gave it to a visiting fish merchant, Arthur Miller, who displayed it in his office. It is now on long term loan to Merseyside Maritime Museum courtesy of Arthur Miller's grandson Dr Arthur Neiland.

There will be an act of remembrance for those lost in the sinking of the Lusitania led by the Rev Steven Brookes, Rector of Liverpool, on the 93rd anniversary of the tragedy. Everyone is welcome to the event, which will take place at 1.30pm Wednesday 7 May on the quayside outside the Piermaster's House - see this handy city centre map for the location.

Update: please note that the remembrance event will now be led by Father Robert Mackley.

Over the past six months staff and volunteers in the Ethnology department have been unpacking, re-storing, documenting and photographing NML's little known Islamic collection.

This fascinating collection ranges from 12th century painted dishes from Iran, to 15th centruy pottery sherds from Fostat, an important trading centre in Egypt, to modern day tourist souvenirs. To whet your appetite here's an image of a wonderful dish from 12th - 13th century Iran showing a huntsman riding his sturdy horse.

12th - 13th century dish from Iran, showing a hunting scene.

Having unpacked the collection it was clear that it needed more attention and research. With the help of the Museum Partnerships department we have secured a grant from the Museums Association's Effective Collections scheme. This grant will pay for an Islamic specialist to come and review the collection and make recomendations as to how we can best use the collection, which might include new displays at NML, loans to other organisations or possibly more research into the collection's history.

I'll keep you posted on how the review goes and what we plan to do next.

The Hesperous, 1942. Image courtesy Liverpool Daily Post and Echo

I’m told duffle coats are coming back into fashion – as they were when I was at school in the 1960s – but little did I realise that they came to the fore on the convoys of the Second World War. The convoys which brought vital supplies across the Atlantic to Britain were constantly threatened by German submarines bent on sinking as many ships as possible.

Once at sea, merchant seafarers were always involved in the daily routine of watches (two and four-hour working shifts). Off-duty time was mostly spent sleeping, playing cards or on other similar pastimes

Whenever a convoy was under attack it took great discipline and nerve to remain at your post. Engine room staff lived closer to death than those on deck, since the engine room was a prime target for U-boat torpedoes and was often a difficult place from which to escape.

Iron ore cargo ships, once torpedoed, were often known to sink literally like stones. The crews of oil tankers knew that they could be burnt alive if their ship was attacked.

In 1942, 8,400 British and Commonwealth merchant seafarers lost their lives in the Atlantic. Nearly a third of the crews died on British ships that were sunk. Government reports said that morale within the merchant navy remained remarkably high. Most of the people involved, however, felt they were just doing their jobs, like millions of others.

Among exhibits on display at the Merseyside Maritime Museum are tiny models of the warships which escorted the convoys. These miniature waterline models, scale 1:1200, show how small Royal Navy ships were compared to capital ships. There are models of the destroyers Montgomery and Vanoc (both built1918) and Fame (1934), sloop Pelican (1939), corvette Abelia (1943) and frigate Allington Castle (1944). By way of comparison, there is a same scale model of one of the Royal Navy’s largest capital ships of the war, the battleship King George V.

There is the commissioning pennant of the destroyer Hesperus which was based in Liverpool for much of the war. A photo shows Hesperus entering the Gladstone Dock in December 1942, her bow crumpled after ramming and sinking the U-357.

An iconic duffle coat is of the type worn by Royal Naval and merchant seafarers on the Atlantic convoys throughout the war. Another iconic item is a Mae West lifejacket as worn by British and allied personnel during the war. It was named after the buxom Hollywood star who was a pin-up of the time.

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo.