National Museums Liverpool Blog - Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Paul Finnegan, a member of our Bug House team, has been lucky enough to receive some Death's-head Hawkmoth caterpillars for World Museum. The Death’s-head is the largest moth in the UK with a wingspan of up to six inches and played a starring role in the famous Silence of the Lamb’s movie poster. These fascinating little creatures migrate from North Africa and parts of Europe to the UK each summer. Adult moths make a loud squeaking sound which, prior to the creation of modern bee hives, the moths used to calm angry bees when raiding hives to steal honey! The caterpillars are currently munching their way through privet leaves and when they are about five inches long they will bury themselves in soil to pupate. After around three months the adult moths will emerge and Paul is hoping to breed them. We’ll keep you updated on their progress…  

We’re looking for young explorers to embark on an exciting journey through crafts and drama to discover more about where they live. Young Explorers is a new group for 8-12 year olds who want to learn new skills and make a difference to their surroundings. The project will culminate in designing an artefact that will be exhibited in World Museum. 

The sessions will be on Saturday mornings in March and April at World Museum, check out our What’s On listings for dates and times. 

Hello,

First of all I would like to wish members of the global Guyanese family a Happy Republic Day for tomorrow.  On 23 February 1970 the Forbes Burnham led government proclaimed Guyana, The Co-operative Republic of Guyana and ended Guyana’s constitutional tie to Britain. Guyana though remains a member of the Commonwealth.

The birth of Guyana as a republic is now also closely associated with the annual Mashramani festival or ‘Mash day’, derived from the Amerindian language which according to the Guyanese Ministry of Culture, Youth & Sport means ‘the celebration of a job well done’. The festival has a carnival atmosphere and is one of the most spectacular annual celebrations in Guyana.

As some people already know I am very proud to be of Guyanese descent.  My father was born in Kitty, Georgetown and moved to the UK in the 1950s to join the RAF.  He was a keen cricketer and some of his pictures were used in our Beyond the Boundary exhibition in 2010.  We also have a "Cuffy Dollar" on display - a silver coin commemorating Guyana’s Republican status in 1970, which was kindly donated by my dad.  The face of the coin shows Cuffy, a national hero, who on the  23 February 1763, led what become known as the Berbice Slave Rebellion, an uprising of enslaved Africans against their brutal and degrading living and working conditions under Dutch rule.   So 2013 is 250 years since this momentous event. 

Berbice was a Dutch colony until 1814 when it was ceded to the British and along with Essequibo and Demerara become British Guiana in 1831, governed from Georgetown, previously known as Stabroek.  The Dutch influence is still very visible though, one of the main newspapers is the Stabroek news and New Amsterdam is one of the largest towns.  There is also a clear Liverpool link as the family of William Gladstone, Liverpool born four times Prime Minister, owned sugar plantations in West Demerara such as Vreed-en-Hoop.

I have visited Guyana on several occasions, the last time in 2008 when I presented a paper at the Commonwealth Association of Museums conference, held at Umana Yana in the capital, Georgetown.  As part of the conference delegates also spent two days in the Iwokrama rainforest reserve, located in one of the few pristine rainforests left in the world.  It’s always good to see the family and not only because I get to eat roti and polouri!

Bye for now,
Richard

Lesbian Gay Bisexual Trans History Month takes place every year this month. It celebrates the lives and achievements of the LGBT community. A Liverpool Trans pioneer and inspiration, Miss April Ashley MBE, will be the focus of a groundbreaking exhibition at the Museum of Liverpool opening in September.

In partnership with Homotopia, the exhibition will tell the story of April’s life and will explore the significant role she has played in making social and political history in Britain. In detailing April’s life, the project will tell the wider story of social, political and legislative change affecting Trans, LGB and many other people in Britain over the past 70 years, and of the impact April’s story has had on family law and legal definitions of gender and identity.

There is still time to get involved - find out more on the Museum of Liverpool website.

Hurrah for half term! Aside from all the great half term events that are taking place at our venues next week, we are also set for some radio interference across the city from 18 – 22 February.

Waves on the Mersey is a project that has been created by Open the Door Theatre in Education, who are bringing five giant radios into the city to broadcast documentaries about major historical events that have shaped Liverpool’s history.

The documentaries have been created by young people between the ages of 14 and 21, who have researched, interviewed and devised radio shows and plays on each topic. They have also decorated the radios, which will be located at five locations around the city, broadcasting a different documentary every day.

The radios can be found at the Museum of Liverpool, FACT, Albert Dock Liverpool (outside Merseyside Maritime Museum), the Metquarter and Liverpool Cathedral. They will each broadcast the following documentaries between 1 – 3pm every day:

Monday 18 February – The Beatles, 1964
Tuesday 19 February – The Toxteth Riots, 1981
Wednesday 20 February – Hillsborough, 1989
Thursday 21 February – The May Blitz, 1941
Friday 22 February – Pope John Paul II’s visit, 1982

You can also tune into 87.7FM to listen to the documentaries, but if you’re able to visit the giant radios, how about doing a trail of them all and getting a picture with each one?

 

Over the last three months the International Slavery Museum education team have been working with a group of young actors from the Street Life Foundation. The group used the painting by William Windus, 'The Black Boy', on display in the International Slavery Museum, as the starting point for a new play 'The Stowaway' written by group leader, Caroline Ihiekwe.

As part of their research the group worked closely with the education teams at the Maritime Museum and Museum of Liverpool, to find out what everyday life was like in Victorian Liverpool and how it affected children and young people of all classes. Mark, a member of the Street Life acting team, tells us more:

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This is my second show I have had the privilege to perform for Street Life. 'The Stowaway' rehearsals were intense, but I have loved every minute of it. Since October we have rehearsed every Sunday at the International Slavery Museum and now, three months on, have a finished show.

Our performance will be on Tuesday 19 February at 1.30 and 3pm.  Unlike our previous show, we have a lot of group scripted work, which was a challenge for some of us but throughout the creative process the group have grown stronger and stronger and now, eventually, the show is complete. We are also in the process of filming the play in and around the Maritime Museum and Museum of Liverpool, so look out for that exciting film debut to come!

So please everyone come and see a show that has had a lot of time and effort put into it, and see how we have interpreted the William Windus painting, ‘The Black Boy’.

Hello all,

Conrad’s classic Heart of Darkness is a powerful indictment of imperialism at its height which swept across Africa and in particular the repressive and brutal reign of the Belgians in the Congo, which had become the fiefdom of King Leopold II. The book centres on Marlow, a sailor who works for a Belgian ivory trading company, and encounters widespread brutality by the company. At the end of the book Conrad's narrator encounters Kurtz (Brando in Apocalypse Now), who had worked for the company but turned himself into a demigod and who was guilty of carrying out horrifying atrocities.

I don’t want to come across as an old curmudgeon on Valentine’s Day but the book sprang to mind when I was thinking of my next blog and the consequences of abused power (imperial and personal) and how that can turn people’s lives upside down, often condemning them to a life of misery.   This does not stop on Valentine’s Day.   

In the past several years we have been building partnerships with several NGO’s in both the UK and abroad such as Anti-Slavery International and Free the Slaves and become acutely aware of the enormity of the issues of contemporary forms of slavery and enslavement and in particular trafficking for labour and sexual exploitation.   What is heartening is the fact that there are so many committed organizations and individuals who refuse to give up the fight and I say with conviction that we at the International Slavery Museum fit into these categories.  In England and Wales since 2011 the Salvation Army has managed the delivery of specialist support services to victims of human trafficking which can be seen in an illuminating report.  

Kurtz’s last words “The horror! The horror!” sadly, still echoes today, but the International Slavery Museum will continue to develop partnerships and be a hub for various human rights organizations and campaigns that fight trafficking and exploitation.  If you have not already done so follow our work via Twitter or Facebook and spread the word.

Finally, if you still need to buy someone a present (that’s pushing it!) try to source a product free from slavery and exploitation.  Even though there have been great strides in making the chocolate industry slavery and exploitation free there is still plenty of campaigning to be done.

Bye for now,

Richard

Anne Gleave, our curator of photographic archives, has chosen this photograph from the fantastic Stewart Bale collection to highlight Valentine’s Day:

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The photograph was taken early to mid February 1934 so we are not sure whether it shows a Valentine’s celebration or not but it would be nice to think so. Reece’s was a well known Liverpool company popular in the early to mid twentieth century; they ran a dairy and bakery plus a number of cafés in and around Liverpool which were popular places for people to meet. At Parker Street Reece’s occupied a number of floors which included a café, restaurant and ballroom. Parker Street is central to Liverpool City Centre and is just off Church Street, one of the main thorough fares, so a prime location.

The commercial photographic firm of Stewart Bale Ltd were commissioned to take this photograph by Reece & Sons Ltd, from their principal offices in Hawke Street, off Brownlow Hill, Liverpool. Stewart Bale was an important firm of Liverpool based photographers who could command significant commissions, which says something about the status of Reece’s. 

If you would like to find out more about our Stewart Bale collection you can view our online information sheet and see a selection of images on the website.

Do you remember Reece's? If anyone has any information about the above image please do get in touch using this contact form.

Love blossomed for Marjorie and John Wilson in a rowing boat just like this one on Sefton Park’s boating lake during the 1940s.

John was a young medical student at Liverpool University and would revise whilst Marjorie rowed.

They got married when Marjorie was 21. John went on to have a successful medical career, becoming a consultant at Wirral Hospital.

This rowing boat is on display in The People’s Republic gallery at the Museum of Liverpool. It was used on Sefton Park Lake until the late 1970s. Who knows what other romances it may have witnessed?

Here's an update from Joyce Parr and Sarah Han, education managers at Seized! The Border and Customs uncovered, about this year's Rush programme:

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It has been lovely to welcome schools again to our drugs awareness event, Rush which takes place each January at Seized! UK Border Force National Museum, based in the Merseyside Maritime Museum. After it finished were exhausted, but we have had a brilliant time, like the kids!

Despite the snow, we welcomed more than 700 young people. The award winning Rush programme (Kids Count Award in 2010) was developed because of concerns about the impact of drugs misuse on young people. We are lucky to work with the UK Border Force who give the museum lots of helpful back up.

Students were enthralled by our play which explores choices involving drugs, and the consequences for the characters. The young people ‘hotseat’ the characters. Here the actors stay ‘in role’ and the pupils ask them questions. They offer advice too - some extremely good - to the characters!

Activities follow - the ‘beer goggle challenge’, a look at simulated drugs, and a chance to handle objects from our collection of seized contraband.  The young people then devise their own endings to the play which is when a serious subject takes a hilarious slant, as the young people have a go at acting/scriptwriting!

Next the young people see the last scene of the play which is thought provoking and unexpected. It’s a full and rewarding day, with a lasting, important message but it’s comments like these that keep us going:

"I now know how personal choices can change your life."
"I’ll probably say ‘NO’ to drugs more fiercely."
"The children found it fun and especially loved the play."

Rush is popular, so to bring a school group next January contact us from September on 0151 478 4814. Throughout the year we also run the following awareness sessions:

• 'Hooked' - substance awareness
• Alcohol awareness
• Weapons awareness