If you come for your holidays to Nidderdale in the Yorkshire Dales – and my goodness, I do recommend it – you’ll want to have an afternoon pottering around Pateley Bridge. It’s just won Britain’s Best Village High Street 2016 award.
And if you come to Pateley Bridge, you jolly well ought to visit Nidderdale Museum. Tucked behind the High Street near the Primary School and the Parish Church on the site of the former Workhouse, it’s a little treasure trove.
This little museum is entirely staffed by volunteers who cherish each donation and display as many as they possibly can in an engaging and informative way. You’ll punctuate your visit with delighted cries of ‘I remember that! My granny had one!’ Or ‘Oooh, I never knew the railway went there. I wonder where the station was?’. You’ll have an animated discussion with a fellow-visitor about being an ink-monitor at school, or about the mangle that was hauled out on washdays when you were a small child.
You’ll also see things that were not part of your own heritage, but which were an important part of Nidderdale’s past. You’ll discover that this pleasant rural area was once an industrial power-house, with textile workers by the score and lead mines dotted over the landscape. You’ll be reminded how very tough day-to-day life was on a Daleside small holding or farm.
Here’s a very quick tour:
We had a Ewbank carpet sweeper at home … and this splendid bed-warmer, simply heated by a light bulb … and a cream-maker.
We had inkwells like this at school, and I spent many painful hours in the company of copy books like these.
But look at this parlour:
And this wholly intact cobbler’s shop, transferred to the Museum in its entirety.
And here’s a glimpse of life on the farm, before labour-saving machinery came along.
We’ll be going again and again. So much to see, to reminisce over, to learn from. This engaging museum is a treasure in its own right.
My visit was one of the perks of being a National Trust volunteer. Brimham Rocks is Fountains Abbey’s nearest neighbour, and staff there organised this trip – thank you! The museum is open at weekends until mid-March, then daily during summer months.
I’ll have to talk to my brother about taking me there some time.
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Do. I’m sure you’d both enjoy it.
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I love museums like this! I also liked the two photos of the High Street – it doesn’t look as though it has changed at all!
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Maybe just a few more cars …. 😉
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Fabulous High Street. Has it been used in any period dramas or adverts yet? If not, sure to be soon. I love that ‘parlour look’, but oh my goodness can you imagine the dusting. ☹️
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Dusting? What’s that? No, I don’t know that Pateley has been a film set – yet.
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Wish I’d gone on the trip now!! I love Pateley and we looked at some properties out there when we wanted to make the move from town to country.
Nidderdale (an AONB as opposed to part of the Yorkshire Dales National Park for reasons that still defeat many) is often overlooked but we love it out there.
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You really should have come. We’ll go again soon.
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We must visit the museum in Pateley Bridge the next time we’re there. It looks really interesting.
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It is. I think you’d have a lot of fun. Meanwhile, enjoy your travels.
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What a lovely post on a fun museum…none of the items looks familiar to me…love the parlour.
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It’s rather fine, isn’t it? Unless you had to.live in it …..
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The best High Street in Great Britain??!?! Wow–that must be saying something! This sort of museum appeals to me no end–that parlour is . . . intense!
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NB – best village high street. Lots of small local businesses, crafts, food. And yes, that parlour. Phew.
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I love this post! And as you say the memories evoked! My grandmother had a carpet sweeper like that, which I had entirely forgotten. And a cream maker. Love the horse brasses and the paper cutouts decorating the dresser shelves, and, and. …
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Ah, but would you have enjoyed the dusting that went with it 😉.
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I take your point 🙂 My gran, a fanatical duster and cleaner of brassware and silverware, would be appalled were she to see the dust and tarnish in our house!
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Just as I’d be appalled if I had it to do.
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Yes, we had Ewbanks, it was my Sunday job at home, my husband’s father had a bed-warmer but my hb’s uncle (a great improviser) made one from a milk powder tin with one bulb in! Inkwells were a pain, someone would always put blotting paper in them and they’d be useless.
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Ooh, what naughty children! I don’t remember that one. Just permanently inky fingers from holding the dip pen so tightly.. Love the idea of the milk powder tin hot water bottle!
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I love anything to do with time travel and am a self proclaimed paleophile / retrophile (hope these terms mean “lover of all things old”. Very nice post!
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Thank you! I hope you’ll be able to do a spot of travelling to Nidderdale one day and visit this little museum..
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Looks great. I too remember many of the items on show. 🙂
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