York Museums Trust Blog

John Oxley, City Archaeologist, talks about York's Jewish cemetry.

Friday afternoon was very wet and very cold.  In spite of that around 60 people turned up at the Yorkshire Museum to go on a walking tour of York dedicated to its Jewish history.

The walk followed the route created by the Institute for the Public Understanding of the Past, which is avaiable here on the History of York website.

What was remarkable for me was the mix of people that made this effort to understand what is a relatively difficult and obscure aspect of the city’s history.  The walk did get plenty of publicity but it still takes genuine interest to get people to venture outdoors on a rainy January afternoon.

This short video gives an exclusive peek at what on earth is going on inside York’s oldest museum. The Yorkshire Museum is having its first total refurbishment since it opened in 1830. As you’ll see, there’s still a bit to do but we are totally committed to reopening on 1 August, Yorkshire Day – this year!

Behind-the-scenes shots of a press event at the British Museum.  It was the launch of the new exhibition ‘Treasures From Medieval York: England’s Other Capital’

All of the treasures are from our own Yorkshire Museum collection.  It’s the first time the BM has displayed another museum’s collection in this way.  Very exciting.

Lady Cockburn and Her Three Eldest Sons

Yorkshire’s Tourism Event of the Year!

That was the accolade given to the Trust’s ‘Grand Tour in York‘ at Welcome to Yorkshire‘s awards ceremony at the Royal Armouries last night.

It was a good night for York all round as the Theatre Royal and National Railway Museum also won awards. And to top it all, prizes were handed out by our very own Archbishop, Dr John Sentamu, who only seemed to lose concentration a little when Pub of the Year was announced (Ye Old Sun Inn at Colton, in case you’re interested).

Shooting a replica pistol from the Dick Turpin era – the early 18th century. 

This afternoon was the first time this demonstration was done live in front of visitors and luckily it worked first time (the gun is not that reliable).

No stagecoach customers were harmed – the pistol was loaded with real gunpowder but fired only balls of tissue.  Turpin would have used lead shot.

The demos are part of the Summer Fun Events programme at the Castle Museum.

York is busy right now.  Hundreds of thousands of visitors come to the city and August is a very popular time to make the pilgrimage. And pilgrimage is a good word for it, ever since early medieval days people have travelled to the city from far and wide.These ‘tourists’ as they are now called have always been an important part of the city’s economy.

What is surprising though, is just how many of our visitors come from the UK rather than overseas.  Even before the recession introduced us to the ‘staycation’ (Brits holidaying at home), 80% of York’s visitors were British.The new Prison exhibition at the Castle Museum is proving popular too, but not quite as popular as when the museum first opened….

by John Storey after Nathaniel Whittock

This is a large coloured lithograph showing York as it apparently appeared in the mid-19th century. The level of minute detail is impressive (click on the picture for a better look), down to boats moored on the river bank and people walking in the Museum Gardens. It is fascinating to look at the way York has changed, particularly the railway station, which was originally inside the city walls.

I could study it for hours – it is well worth a look in the flesh.  The lithograph can be seen in the exhibition “A Different View” in the Little Gallery at the Art Gallery until July 2009. 

Info by Jenny, reference R1946

The latest addition to the History of York website is very seasonal – a page about Guy Fawkes and his York connections.

I knew that Fawkes was born in the city but I hadn’t realised before that he was one of three Gunpowder Plotters to have grown up here.  Two of his pals from school, the brothers John and Kit Wright, were also deeply involved and ended up losing their lives because of the plot.  It seems that York harboured a resistance community that was willing to kill and die for their religious cause.

Our web presence has grown a little more; we’ve been experimenting our new Flickr account. We’ll try to restrict it to good quality photos and strong images.

It’s been there for a while, but it was really kicked into life with the Grand Tour in York‘s own Flickr Set.  Since then we’ve begun adding content for each of our sites, plus a special History of York Set that’s looking really good already.

There’s even a taster in the box a the bottom of this page…..

This morning we launched a fantastic new event-cum-exhibition on the streets of York.

There’s been an embargo on news about it, so nothing on the blog either, but for the last few months we have been beavering away, laying plans, choosing sites, getting permissions and generally running around trying to make this happen.

We’ve been working with one big organisation – the National Gallery – and one huge one – Hewlet-Packard – to bring 49 reproduction paintings to the streets. It has been an interesting and exciting process. The support within the city of York has been wonderful.

In the spirit of the blog here are a few behind the scenes shots:

The team fitting the paintings deserve a plug – they also printed them – : EPS

The official site is here: www.thegrandtourinyork.org.uk