The British Postal Museum & Archive

British Postal Museum & Archive
Established 2004
Location Clerkenwell, London, England.
Public transit access Farringdon, Angel
Website www.postalheritage.org.uk
Post Office vehicles in the BPMA's collection.
The British Postal Museum & Archive at Autumn Stampex 2015.

The British Postal Museum & Archive (BPMA) is a charitable trust responsible for maintaining the archives of the history of the British postal system, as well as organizing exhibitions and educational resources. Established in 2004, it has operations in London, Essex and Shropshire. Although it is an independent organisation it is strongly connected with the Royal Mail Group, from which it receives a yearly payment for its management of the Royal Mail Archive.

The British Postal Museum & Archive changed to The Postal Museum on 4 February 2016. The Postal Museum, due to open in central London in 2017, will reveal five stories from centuries of British social and communications history as well as offering visitors an immersive subterranean ride on the old Post Office Underground Railway - Mail Rail.

Sites

The BPMA operates three sites: The Royal Mail Archive at Mount Pleasant sorting office in Clerkenwell, London, a museum store in Loughton, Essex and The Museum of the Post Office in the Community, located about the post office in Blists Hill Victorian Town, Shropshire.

Origins of the BPMA

The 1838 Public Records Act was the first step in organizing government archives, including the civil service department known then as ‘the Post Office’. This represents the beginnings of what is now The Royal Mail Archive. By 1896 a report concerning the maintenance of Post Office records had been produced and the first archivist was appointed. The Public Records Acts of 1958 and 1967 reinforced the need for the Post Office to keep, catalogue and make its archive records available.

In 1966, the first National Postal Museum (NPM) was established, in part due to the Phillips Collection of Victorian philately being donated to the nation by Reginald M. Phillips. The museum was opened by the Queen on 19 February 1969, at King Edward Building near St Paul's Cathedral in London. A collection of postal equipment, uniforms, vehicles and much more was developed over the years; far more than could be displayed in the small museum.

In 1998, the King Edward Building was sold, and the NPM closed. The collections were retained and the management of the museum and archive was combined. This was known as the Heritage unit of the Post Office (then renamed Consignia, then Royal Mail Group).

Royal Mail Group decided to transfer the work of this heritage unit to an independent charitable trust, in light of the changing mail market and its own shift from public service to competitive business. This 'Postal Heritage Trust' came into being in April 2004, and was branded as The British Postal Museum & Archive.

Since 2004, the BPMA has expanded its work into providing a programme of events, exhibitions, education and web resources.[1]

Relationship with Royal Mail

The BPMA is an independent charity but is strongly linked with Royal Mail Group. The Director of the BPMA is Adrian Steel.[2] The BPMA receives an annual payment from Royal Mail for managing the Royal Mail archive. Although the archive is part of the BPMA, because it is a public record, ultimate responsibility for it lies with Royal Mail. The records have been given official designated status which means that they are recognised as nationally important, and available to researchers at Freeling House in London.

The former National Postal Museum collections were donated to the BPMA by Royal Mail Group. These are currently housed in a Museum Store in Essex. This is open to the public on selected dates throughout the year, but the BPMA admits it is not a carefully designed museum. The BPMA is currently working on a project to relocate the organisation and re-establish the postal museum and Royal Mail archive in Calthorpe House, London.[3]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "British Postal Museum & Archive". British Postal Museum & Archive. Retrieved 11 July 2012.
  2. ↑ "Nerves of Steel" by Andrew Neish in British Philatelic Bulletin, Vol. 51, No. 5, January 2014, pp. 144-147.
  3. ↑ "New Postal Museum". The British Postal Museum & Archive. Retrieved 11 July 2012.

External links

Media related to British Postal Museum & Archive at Wikimedia Commons

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