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Should Britain stop building museums?
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tjj
tjj
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Edited Feb 21, 2018, 17:31
Re: Should Britain stop building museums?
Feb 21, 2018, 17:28
Sanctuary wrote:

We have a wonderful museum down here in Launceston (Cornwall) which I'm ashamed to say I only made my first visit to last year. Thinking it would just be filled with 'local stuff' that I arrogantly thought I would already know about, I'd always given it a miss. How wrong I was and have now been back twice more.
The sad part is that on my visits I have virtually had the place to myself and because of this lack of custom, the museum is now totally staffed by unpaid volunteers who are, without exception, furiously enthusiastic retired folk! Without them it would fold - no question!

I suppose you have to be realistic and if, like any other business, you are not attracting Joe Public in, your days are numbered!

We have a great many other attractions in Cornwall that parents prefer to take their kids to these days just to keep them quiet and let's face it, *most* kids see traditional museums as just stuffy old places until much later in life.


Stopped for lunch in Launceston on the way back from a few days in Fowey last year. I liked the town a lot, just an ordinary little working town without the touristy feel most of the coastal villages have. I'm sure we would have visited the museum if we had seen it. You are right though, I don't visit my local museum very often even though it's free (also a very fine but small art gallery boasting works by well known 20th century artists such as Lowry).
What will happen I wonder when the internet finally crashes big time, most of the libraries and museums closed, book shops a thing of the past - there will be a whole new level of archaeological investigation waiting for our descendants in centuries (or perhaps even decades) to come.

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