The volunteer run Rocks by Rail – the Living Ironstone Museum situated near Cottesmore in Rutland has recently been notified that it is to be offered a grant of £9057 from the Governments Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Culture Recovery Fund to help the museum prepare for re-opening as the COVID 19 pandemic restrictions are slowly lifted.

This has come as very welcome news to the museum which has been unable to open its doors to visitors since October 2019. The lockdowns and restrictions have had a severe impact on museum finances and a number of infrastructure projects have suffered major delays as the majority of its working volunteers stayed home away from the museum. With restrictions now easing the museum is looking forward to welcoming back its committed volunteer workforce shortly to enable long delayed projects to be completed in time for the re-opening of the museum for visitors.

Mr Andy Salmon, the museum’s General Manager commented :

The museums volunteers are delighted to receive the financial support offered by the Government through its Arts council Culture Recovery Fund. The grant will help us to plan and implement the next steps on the pathway to re-opening the museum to visitors. The grant will be used to undertake staff refresher training and implement appropriate health and safety improvements such as signage and replacement visitor safety fencing. Further improvements to disabled access will also be undertaken before the museum re-opens to the public. New exhibitions will be available in time for the museum to re-open to visitors from 4^th July 2021. Further details on the re-opening and an events programme for the rest of the year will be posted on the museum’s website shortly.