Celebrating an outstanding year

We are celebrating securing over £75,000 through funding and donations in 2017.

The Trust received backing from a number of funding partners across the UK during the year, enabling us to deliver programmes to people from all ages and backgrounds in Barnsley and South Yorkshire.

The projects range from facilitating poetry workshops for people with life-limiting illnesses and their carers, to supporting a series of workshops for primary school children to enhance their learning of ancient Egyptian civilisation, hosted by BAFTA-winning professor and Egyptologist, Joann Fletcher.

The funding will help us to preserve, enhance and champion the borough’s heritage for the future.

Over one third of the money (£30,000) was secured via the Foyle Foundation in July. The grant making organisation supports charities in the arts and learning sectors. This funding provided access to museum services for pupils from primary schools in deprived areas of Barnsley, that wouldn’t have otherwise been able to access services.

A total of £20,000 was secured through donations from the public and the Trust’s corporate supporters. £15,000 of this covered a series of educational workshops for primary school children to enhance their learning of ancient Egyptian, and £5,000 went towards the rehoming of Light Lines – an art installation to remember the many brave soldiers who fell at the Battle of the Somme. The artwork is now on permanent display in Barnsley town centre.

In November, we were successful in securing £10,000 via the National Lottery’s ‘Awards for All’ scheme to provide a new mobile bread oven at Worsbrough Mill & Country Park. The purchase of the mobile bread oven and trailer means that workshops can now be delivered by a miller throughout Barnsley in 2018.

We were also delighted to receive a cheque for £3,562 via the Coop Local Community Fund. This will provide a family trail and digital resources for families visiting the mill.

In the same month, a total of £2,500 was secured via the Better Barnsley Bond which supports training, employment and local community initiatives in the town. The project will give 300 young people opportunities and skills in creative and digital learning, specifically targeting young people from deprived communities and linking to the ceramics collection at Cannon Hall Museum.

Other programmes which received funding in 2017 include painting and framing conservation for a new Dutch paintings exhibition secured through Woodmansterne Art Conservation Fund and the Idlewild Trust, and a public vote for conservation of the Medieval Charter on display at Experience Barnsley Museum and paid for through donations from the public.

Margot Walker, chair of trustees, said: “2017 has been an outstanding year for the Trust and we are thrilled to have secured so many exciting projects and schemes which will benefit people of all ages and backgrounds.

“We’d like to say a big thank you to everyone who has donated when visiting one of Barnsley’s museums and to our corporate supporters, NPS Barnsley and Barnsley College. Donations, however big or small, really do make a difference and help us safeguard our museums so that future generations can continue to be inspired.”