£16k grant for Ravenglass museum

The Ravenglass Railway Museum Trust has been awarded £16,000 by the Arts Council-administered PRISM Fund. The grant will be used for the conservation and display of the only RER 3ft gauge carriage body to survive - the 1875-built ‘big saloon’. Stanegate Restorations & Replicas at Haltwhistle, Northumberland, will undertake the specialist work and the body will be displayed in the trust’s extended museum later this year. The museum extension, supported by grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the RER Preservation Society, is scheduled to be handed over for fitting out by the end of March. Alongside the 3ft gauge carriage, a key exhibit will be the restored Heywood 0-4-0T Katie, of which only the frames are original. Following the steam test last November (SR461), the locomotive was tested successfully at Station Road Steam, Metheringham, Lincolnshire, the trust’s contractor. It has been painted in Heywood style, and is due to be transported to Ravenglass shortly.