Lowestoft Maritime Museum is a private museum in the town of

Lowestoft Lowestoft ( ) is a coastal town and civil parish in the East Suffolk district of Suffolk, England.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . As the most easterly UK settlement, it is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and sou ...

Suffolk Suffolk () is a ceremonial county of England in East Anglia. It borders Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south; the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich; other important towns include Lowes ...

, England that is dedicated to local and national maritime history. Its exhibits include maritime artefacts including medals awarded to

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...

and RNLI personnel,

marine art Marine art or maritime art is a form of figurative art (that is, painting, drawing, printmaking and sculpture) that portrays or draws its main Sea in culture, inspiration from the sea. Maritime painting is a genre that depicts ships and the sea� ...

, the

fishing industry The fishing industry includes any industry or activity concerned with taking, culturing, processing, preserving, storing, transporting, marketing or selling fish or fish products. It is defined by the Food and Agriculture Organization as including ...

in Lowestoft and the town's involvement with the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

shipwrights Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to befor ...

and coopers tools, an extensive collection of

ship model Ship models or model ships are scale models of ships. They can range in size from 1/6000 scale wargaming miniatures to large vessels capable of holding people. Ship modeling is a craft as old as shipbuilding itself, stretching back to ancient t ...

s in various scales, the workshop of

Christopher Cockerell Sir Christopher Sydney Cockerell CBE RDI FRS (4 June 1910 – 1 June 1999) was an English engineer, best known as the inventor of the hovercraft. Early life and education Cockerell was born in Cambridge, where his father, Sir Sydney Cocke ...

, the inventor of the

hovercraft A hovercraft, also known as an air-cushion vehicle or ACV, is an amphibious Craft (vehicle), craft capable of travelling over land, water, mud, ice, and other surfaces. Hovercraft use blowers to produce a large volume of air below the hull ...

, and a small display dedicated to Thomas Crisp, a local man who posthumously won the

Victoria Cross The Victoria Cross (VC) is the highest and most prestigious award of the British honours system. It is awarded for valour "in the presence of the enemy" to members of the British Armed Forces and may be awarded posthumously. It was previously ...

during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Britain's most easterly museum, it is run by enthusiasts and volunteers and is open to the public from late April to late October each year. The museum was the Suffolk Museum of the Year in 2012 and a finalist in 2014. There is an admission charge.Lowestoft Maritime Museum on the Culture24 website
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History

The Lowestoft and East Suffolk Maritime Society was founded in 1958 by a number of local maritime enthusiasts including Engineer Captain E.G. Malet-Warden, RN (Retd.), Captain N.C. Darnell, MN (Retd.), and Skipper Lieutenant William 'Bill' Soloman RNPS (Retd.), the latter in particular being mainly responsible for acquiring a substantial part of the collection now at the Maritime Museum.The History of the Museum, Lowestoft Maritime Museum website
/ref> As the size of the collection increased, in 1968 the Borough Council granted the Society the lease of a period cottage in Sparrow's Nest Park in Lowestoft to house a permanent Maritime Museum. Each room in the cottage was initially dedicated to various aspects of the fishing industry in addition to a special display on the Royal Naval Patrol Service, the headquarters of which for both World wars was located in the adjacent Sparrow's Nest Park, named as HMS ''Europa''. As the collection continued to grow in size and scope, in 1977 the cottage was extended at the cost of £10,000, which was raised through donations and fund-raising activities. The "Bill Soloman Room" was named in honour of Skipper "Bill" Soloman who had largely been responsible for acquiring and setting up the collection and who had recently died. This extension was opened in 1978 by

Prince Philip Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (born Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark, later Philip Mountbatten; 10 June 1921 – 9 April 2021) was the husband of Queen Elizabeth II. As such, he served as the consort of the British monarch from E ...

. In 2010 the museum gained a

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

grant which enabled a major overhaul of the displays through a new extension. This was opened by

Princess Anne Anne, Princess Royal (Anne Elizabeth Alice Louise; born 15 August 1950), is a member of the British royal family. She is the second child and only daughter of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and the only sister of K ...

in 2010. In March 2016 the museum received its Arts Council Accreditation.

Exhibits

The exhibits on display include a wide range of maritime artefacts including a display of medals awarded to naval and RNLI personnel, a large display of

and ships in bottles, the

in Lowestoft and the town's involvement with the Royal Navy in

, a workbench of

and coopers tools, an extensive collection of

s in various scales, the workshop of

, the inventor of the

, reassembled at the museum following his death in 1999 and which displays his original tools and machinery including his left-handed

lathe A lathe () is a machine tool that rotates a workpiece about an axis of rotation to perform various operations such as cutting, sanding, knurling, drilling, deformation, facing, and turning, with tools that are applied to the workpiece to c ...

, a display about Robert William Hook (1828–1911),

coxswain The coxswain ( , or ) is the person in charge of a boat, particularly its navigation and steering. The etymology of the word gives a literal meaning of "boat servant" since it comes from ''cock'', referring to the cockboat, a type of ship's boat ...

at RNLI Lowestoft from 1853 to 1883 who was credited with saving more than 600 lives during his career, and a small display dedicated to Thomas Crisp, a local man who posthumously won the

during

, including his original

Memorial Plaque A commemorative plaque, or simply plaque, or in other places referred to as a historical marker, historic marker, or historic plaque, is a plate of metal, ceramic, stone, wood, or other material, typically attached to a wall, stone, or other ...

. Other exhibits range from interactive displays for children including a maritime identification trail, Lowestoft's connection with Madam Prunier and her London restaurant, a range of historic photographs and paintings, Lowestoft at war, a reconstruction of a ship's wheelhouse with working VHS radio to listen into passing ships and a small museum cinema showing archive films.The Museum – Lowestoft Maritime Museum website
/ref> A shop sells a variety of maritime-themed goods.

References

External links

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Lowestoft Maritime Museum on The Suffolk Coast websiteLowestoft Maritime Museum Art Collection on the Art UK website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lowestoft Maritime Museum Lowestoft Maritime museums in England Museums in Suffolk Museums established in 1968