Somerset Coalfield Life at Radstock Museum is looking for volunteers to help run the museum shop.

Currently, Museum Volunteer, Jenny Newbury, is volunteer Shop Manager and spends a few hours a week stocking up on local history and walks books, prints by local artists, greetings cards, postcards, small gifts and toys for the younger visitors. She prices the items and displays them. Jenny also checks the shop email for mail order items, which she sends all over the world. Other aspects of her role include bringing new items into the shop; for example, when the museum was kindly given drawings of local scenes by Christopher Pulsford, she organised mugs, key rings, notepads and other small items to be printed with the drawings, which were then sold in the shop. Jenny also liaises with the volunteers who assist in the shop.

Jenny has been volunteering as Shop Manager for the last seven years and is now hoping to move onto other volunteering roles within the museum; but first, she is looking forward to welcoming new volunteers and guiding and training them to help keep this popular museum shop open for the future.

She said: “Before I retired, I was a Dorothy House community nurse specialist for over fifteen years. For most of that time, Radstock and the surrounding ex-coalmining villages were my ‘patch’. I felt very much part of the community. So, when I retired at the end of 2011, I knew that I wanted to volunteer at Radstock Museum.

“Early in 2012, I joined the museum’s documentation team and helped once a week on the till in the shop. But very quickly I was asked to take over the lead volunteer role for the shop, which I did. This was a very steep learning curve for me, as I had no retail experience. But one of the joys of volunteering is learning new skills.

“Another joy is meeting new people, and the other museum volunteers are friendly and supportive. I find volunteering at the museum interesting and rewarding.”

If you think you might be interested in this role/role-share or any other volunteering opportunities within the museum, email: [email protected]

Lucy Tudor