Micro Memories
Susie Kearley relives the carefree days of the bubble car at Lincolnshire’s quirkiest museum!
ON a farm in the heart of the Lincolnshire countryside is a fabulously quirky museum. The Bubblecar Museum is home to a fantastic collection of vintage bubble cars, microcars and other weird and wonderful vehicles: Bond Bugs, Bambys, Trojans, Dell’ortos and Frisky Sports all line the exhibition hall.
Walk through the museum and you pass a 1960s lounge and kitchen display. Old domestic appliances and vintage children’s games are on show. Matching picnic cases, a dolls’-house and string puppets instantly take you back to childhood days.
There’s an old wooden caravan, vintage petrol pumps going back decades, and a garage workshop with the body of a Peel microcar inside.
A Reliant van on display is a cross between a van and a motorcycle, with all the characteristics of a van, except for the steering and controls; it has handle bars and the controls of a motorbike.
On the first floor there’s a collection of vintage motorcycles and scooters, a “funk tech” three-wheel drive with stabilisers, an unusual “Pink Panther” car, and a Peugeot 49 cc moped with a weather-proof cabin, which looks just a bit unstable!
The owners, Mike and Paula Cooper, had the idea for the Bubblecar Museum in the early 2000s. Mike had been a microcar enthusiast for years, travelling around Europe in quirky automobiles, catching people’s attention on his journeys.
“He’d always run at least one microcar and travelled extensively in various tiny cars,” Paula explains. “He had a Messerschmitt, Heinkel and a Berkeley, to name a few. By the turn of the century, people were saying there should be a museum of microcars and it got us thinking about the possibilities.
“Although there were impressive private collections in the UK,
they were not open to the public. After considerable thought, lots of measuring and some serious planning, we decided to open a microcar museum on our four-acre plot in Lincolnshire. There was a lot of work to do!
“We both had a background in motor vehicle restoration,” Paula continues. “We’d been running a successful 2CVbased small car restoration business in Somerset for a number of years.
“When we sold up in 2002 and moved to Byards Leap in Lincolnshire, we realised that the microcar museum concept could become a reality.
“We got support from local authorities and grants to help us get started, then cars began to arrive. We had some vehicles already. We added to the collection, buying some more, and a few were donated.
“There was one hairraising moment when a local authority grant provider pulled out because they’d read the postcode wrongly on the application form! But we survived the experience and it all went ahead. We bought an ancient digger and started work on constructing the museum buildings.
“On Christmas Day 2003 we were both sitting on the roof of the museum assiduously nailing on roof tiles, waving to incredulous passing motorists!
“The project came together and we opened to the public in 2004, with displays of cars and 1950s artefacts. A year later, we
added a new wing to house more vehicles. TV appearances on several programmes boosted visitor numbers. Car rallies flocked to book the campsite for weekend events.
“In 2010, we applied to extend the building again, but the application was turned down, so we started looking for somewhere larger. With some vehicles left outdoors at the mercy of weather conditions, the prospect of a move became quite urgent.
“In 2011 we were relieved
to find new premises at Langrick, near Boston. We closed the museum for a year, enabling us to get the new building and exhibition spaces into shape, and opened in 2012 to a wave of publicity from TV shows who filmed antiques and car programmes at the museum. Visitor numbers soared.
“Now we house over fifty vehicles, including cars, scooters and motorbikes, with 1960s room sets, vintage toys, and shop fronts from the 1950s and 60s.
There’s a scrap yard and garage, and we get visitors from across the globe. We also have a tearoom and a shop selling locally crafted and vintage products.” n