Welcome to the Prickwillow Museum blog

An invitation to join our 100 Club.

16/3/2021

Prickwillow Engine Museum are delighted to announce the new 100 Club, a great opportunity to support the museum whilst having a bit of a flutter!
Monthly cash prizes of up to £100 and annual bonus prizes of up to £420 (subject to terms and conditions). Please read the rules (downloadable below).

Join before the 1st May for the first draw on 25th May 2021 by completing the application form (downloadable below). For further details please CONTACT US.

If you would like to support the Museum to prepare for opening with additional safety measures in place, but do not want to join the 100 Club you can still donate HERE.

We plan to open at the end of May, and hope to celebrate the 100th Birthday of the Vickers Petter Engine with a weekend of events in July – please watch this space! Current rules will not let us hold any events before this date.

Thank you for your continued support – we really appreciate it.

Application form
File Size:	93 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

100 Club rules
File Size:	180 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

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Events 2021

24/12/2020

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It is with heavy hearts that it has been decided that we will not be holding the traditional Prickwillow Ploughing Festival in the foreseeable future in its current form.
The trustees of the Museum, together with the Clarke family, whose support of the Museum continues to be appreciated, have reluctantly taken the decision due to spiralling costs of organising and running the event, together with the increasing strain on the farm activities.
Things have been exacerbated in recent years by the inclement weather. This was particularly the case in 2019 when the wet weather and consequential deterioration in ground conditions caused cancellation of field activities and a severe drop in visitor numbers, and as a result in income. Bizarrely, it has been recognised that we were fortunate that the 2020 event was cancelled due to Covid, as the weather on the planned Festival dates could have led to a considerable loss, a risk which we are unable to sustain as the Museum always has to operate on very tight margins.
We would like to thank exhibitors, visitors, and volunteers for their support over the last 10 years. Since 2010, including donations, a remarkable £27,000 has been donated to Cancer Research UK, ring fenced for oesophageal cancer, in memory of Nigel Clarke.
The Museum is looking to organise an alternative smaller scale event the end of September.

Events 2001
We hope to welcome you at the planned events at the Museum in 2021. A few dates are pencilled in but please keep a watch on our website www.prickwillowmuseum.com for further day and evening event announcements when the regulations are clearer.
Tractor Run – April 25th
Bike Day – May 16th
Car Day – June 13th
Vickers Petter 100th Birthday weekend celebrations July 3rd/4th
We are hoping to resurrect our first sixties event in August and plan a further event the end of September.
You can still support the Museum, as it strives to improve its exhibits and put in place Covid-secure practices ready for re-opening in the Spring, at our GoFundMe page link on our website or at https://gf.me/u/x3tij6 A big thank you to all those who have donated to date, it really helps.

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Art Competition

28/10/2020

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During lockdown, we invited primary schools who usually visit the Museum for workshops, to take part in an art competition to draw and/or colour a picture of one of our engines.
We were really encouraged to receive entries from Denver V.C. Primary School pupils (aged 6) and thank them for their interest.
A local artist judged the entries, and images of the entries from the prize winners are shown. It was a hard job to choose the winners and all the children were congratulated and received a Museum pen. All the pictures will be on display at the Museum when we open again, hopefully in April 2021.

If any individual primary aged children would like to send in a drawing to display at the Museum's exhibition, please draw and colour one of our engines featured on the website, and send to the Museum no later than the end of February 2021. There will be a prize of an art set for the best of these pictures, judged by the local artist. Please include the name, age, and contact details on the back of the entry, along with an adult’s signature confirming it is the child’s own, unaided work.

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What’s happening at the museum during the lock down?

11/9/2020

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An update from one of our volunteers, Ken Woods.

Work has been progressing very well with the twin cylinder Ruston engine. Cylinder heads are on, valves have been ground in, rocker assemblies fitted, air receiver tank positioned, and air pipes run from the air receiver to the engine.
Main jobs still to do are: running a large bore metal airline from engine room 1 through the building, avoiding other exhibits, doors, and walkways on route to the air receiver; mount fuel tank on a suitable wall and plumb to engine; fit high pressure fuel lines on the engine; sort out a water supply and tank for the cooling system on the engine, and fit auxiliary compressor to engine.
We have also been bequeathed an oar by G. N. Poynter, which he used in the Oxford boat in the 1944 unofficial Oxford and Cambridge boat race. This race was rowed at Queen Adelaide between Littleport and Ely due to the heavy bombing in London at the time. The oar is now mounted on the wall just off the café area.
Next year, we celebrate the 100th birthday of our twin cylinder Vickers Petter engine, so we are hoping to have something special in the way of a celebration to commemorate this event. I wonder if the engine will be getting a telegram?
Due to the current COVID-19 crisis, the museum remains closed and we are not expecting to open again this year. Our plan at the moment is to re-open at Easter 2021 with a full programme of events throughout the year, subject to any controls and restrictions imposed by the government.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support in the past, and look forward to seeing you when things return to the “new normal”.
In the meantime if you would like to support the Museum in these difficult times you can help by making a donation on our appeal page HERE.

Ken Woods runs our Facebook page in addition to his other volunteer duties. Please 'like' our page there, and join in the chat. FACEBOOK PAGE.

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COVID-19 Update

15/7/2020

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The Government, as you will be aware, have announced that museums may open from early July with certain restrictions in place.
However, our Museum is 100% reliant on volunteers and as the majority of these fall into the classification of potentially vulnerable persons, the Trustees feel, unfortunately, that the Prickwillow Engine Museum will have to remain closed until at least the end of August 2020, and will continue to review the situation.
It is vital on opening that the Museum can adequately staff the important ‘front of house’ roles of reception desk and kitchen/tea shop, as well as undertaking the necessary high clean routines in critical areas, as directed by the Government, to keep visitors and volunteers safe.

If you are interested and able to fulfil these essential volunteer roles, supplementing the very few at present able to, or would like to help for a few hours a month in the future, then please contact us by email on prickwillowmuseumadm1@outlook.com of 01353 720737 for more information. Any assistance will be most welcome as ‘a little by several is better than a lot by a few!’

Finally, if you would like to support the Museum in these difficult times, while we are trying to enhance the visitor experience for when we can open again, you can help by making a donation HERE.

A big thank you to all those who have supported us to date.

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An invitation to join our 100 Club.

Events 2021

Art Competition

What’s happening at the museum during the lock down?

COVID-19 Update

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