Whitstable Museum and Gallery
Whitstable Museum is a heritage centre in Whitstable, Kent, displaying Invicta, one of the world's oldest steam engines, the history of the local oyster trade, and historical diving equipment.
History
The present museum was established in 1985. The museum received the Nautiek Award, for services to diving history, in 2001; the first time the award had been given to a UK establishment. In 2015, the museum was reopened following a refurbishment, part-funded by a £15,000 grant from Arts Council England.The building's small doorway opens up into a large hall of displays. In 1881, the Ancient Order of Foresters bought the building, and inscribed "Foresters' Hall" over the door.
Exhibits
The museum has collections and displays on themes of the natural world, local oyster trade, early diving and the actor, Peter Cushing, who lived locally, as well as displays on the 1953 floods, shipwrecks and maritime archaeology. The collections are held under the following headings: social history, science and technology, maritime, land transport, fine art, decorative and applied art, archives and archaeology.The museum displays the unique 1830 steam locomotive Invicta, which operated on the Canterbury and Whitstable Railway, and Whitstable's first horse-drawn fire pump, which required twenty-six volunteers to operate. In 1867, the Norwich Union Fire Insurance Society donated it to the town. The diving display shows standard diving dress with Siebe Gorman helmet and the traditional red bonnet to protect the head against the helmet. The museum also contains relics from the East Indiaman Hindostan, which wrecked at Margate in January 1803.
In 2010, the BBC chose the pudding pan pots from Whitstable Museum as objects illustrating the history of Kent as part of the A History of the World in 100 Objects project.