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Mission Statement
"The aim of the Wrekin Museum Partnership is to create in Wellington, a dedicated museum space that tells the story of Shropshire's best known landmark, The Wrekin and the towns and villages that have grown up around it. Exploring the history of The Wrekin and its surroundings from 600 million BC to today, we want people to discover its unique geology, its diverse wildlife and the people who have lived worked and played there for thousands of years. We want to create a high quality, innovative museum environment that will attract and engage a range of people of all ages and backgrounds, both from the local area and visitors from further afield".Museum Partnership origins and aims
The Wrekin Museum Partnership (WMP) was created in 2007 to explore opportunities to develop a museum in Wellington. The group’s vision is for a lively, high quality attraction that tells the story of the iconic Wrekin hill, its formation, ecology, biodiversity, prehistory and its human history, from Iron Age warriors and Norman huntsmen to 18th century pleasure‐seekers and Victorian preachers. Interwoven with stories of the hill will be stories of Wellington and the other settlements of the ancient Wrekin Forest, from early times to today.The museum will not just be a collection of objects from the past, (although that will be an important part of what it represents), but a dynamic focus for examining and explaining innovations in science and technology, an opportunity for local arts to be promoted and local people to find a voice.
This project needs to be sustainable in the long term and create an attraction worthy of the name. In ‘pretty’ tourist towns, mediocre museums are beneficiaries of high visitor footfall and so they remain viable. In Wellington the model is reversed: we need a museum that acts as an attractor, encouraging high visitor footfall.
What About The Wrekin Area?
THE WREKINis a magical place. It’s unique. We who live here want to share our proud inheritance and show you our hill, its forest, surrounding landscape and people.
THE WREKIN HILL
is our own little mountain, millions of years older than Everest, with an extraordinary geological history.
THE WREKIN FOREST
has patches of ancient semi-natural woodland, modern managed woods and areas where industrial damage is gradually regenerating.
THE WEALD MOORS
consist of postglacial pools and swamps transformed into highly productive farmland.
OUR COALFIELD
gave rise to many early industries.
PEOPLE are our greatest asset. We have produced a host of local characters over the centuries whose inventions and personalities have affected life around the globe.
TOWNS AND VILLAGES
are many and varied with great character and long histories.
WE ARE WELCOMING
Above all this is a friendly place where strangers are welcomed, as are you to our online museum; we hope you will enjoy exploring our homeland.
How Was The Wrekin Formed?
There are two versions; the Giant Story and Geological History.THE GIANTS STORY
In the first, a Giant was carrying a huge shovel full of rocks to drown Shrewsbury. He met a cobbler from Wellington who told him he had worn out all his sack of shoes walking from there, so the Giant dumped his rocks and there was The Wrekin.
THE GEOLOGISTS STORY
Geologists tell us that The Wrekin’s oldest rocks were formed 600,000,000 years ago by volcanic activity as far south as the Falkland Islands and moved over the Earth’s surface, gradually added to by other sedimentary rocks. There was plenty of action in those six hundred million years.
Peoples Of The Wrekin - A Potted History
There may have been people living around here since the retreat of the last Ice Age; we don’t know. However, Stone Age objects have been found nearby. The first we can prove are Bronze Age folks, who built a hillfort and a large cemetery on the hillside.Iron Age Celts The Cornovii are thought to have extended the earthworks and made it their principal hillfort.
About 2,000 years ago they were followed by Romans who built a new town named Viroconium after The Wrekin. Five centuries later the early English took over and another 500 years later the Normans arrived, by which time most of the towns, villages and hamlets had been founded and named. Although nobody now lived on the hill it was so important that Normans talked of The Wrekin Forest and Wellington under The Wrekin. Since then we have had Wars of the Roses, the Civil War, the Industrial Revolution and since the two world wars a great surge of technological innovations.
The last 60 years has seen a huge influx of people, Polish people fleeing the Soviet annex in the 1940's, many came from the old British Empire – mainly India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Africa and the Caribbean. Since the 1960's most were attracted from Birmingham and the Black Country by a Government regeneration scheme called Telford New Town, where new estates were inserted into the fields between ancient, well established communities. The population has already doubled and building continues, centered around an American style shopping mall.
The Landscape
The dominant feature is The Wrekin with its attendants, Ercall, Maddocks, Lawrence and Little Hill; all connect by their small forest. The hills sweep down to the River Severn in the south and west, while the Weald Moors occupy the north with the ancient market towns of Wellington and Newport.Built on the east Shropshire coalfield, many old-established towns and villages began as agricultural settlements in the forest, mined coal, limestone and iron, developing heavy and light engineering, some of which endures despite the coal being exhausted. Between these places were many fields on which modern estates have been developed. Fortunately there is a recent move to restore the town centres of Oakengates, Dawley and Madeley, which were often overlooked in the first phases of planning. Restoration should encourage community involvement and a sense of place for people moving into the area.
The farmlands on three sides of the hills are gently rolling fields, punctuated by villages of various sizes, with the town of Newport to the north-east and the Roman city of Viroconium (Wroxeter) in the west. Although the fields are productive – barley, wheat, oilseed, vegetables, cattle and sheep – most villagers are commuters or work from home, with far more computers than tractors. Overall it’s a pleasant landscape, dotted with trees, fields and woods; a good place to live.