V&A Museum gives working model railway to the Bluebell
LONDON’S Victoria and Albert Museum of Childhood has donated a working OO-gauge model railway in a speciallyproduced case to the Bluebell Railway for display in the SteamWorks! attraction at Sheffield Park station running shed.
The museum in Bethnal Green displays exhibits created for or by children, but a huge refit of the entire building has meant that all exhibits must go either into storage or to new homes.
The coin-operated model was constructed about 20 years ago and ended up at the Sussex heritage line largely due to a curator’s father who thought of the Bluebell Railway as a fitting permanent home.
Stock included
Several locomotives and carriages were included in the donation, including two models of LNER A3 Flying Scotsman.
A mechanism lifts the entire glass top 2ft in the air, so that the model is accessible for maintenance and attending to derailments. Bluebell marketing and communications manager Ruth Rowatt appealed for anyone with spare Southern locomotives to donate them, and also would like to hear from volunteers prepared to maintain the model. She can be contacted at ruth.rowatt@ bluebell-railway.co.uk
The railway costs visitors 20p a time to operate, and funds will go towards polishing the fullsize engines on display.