Be a good sport – support the Winding House

Local people are being encouraged to help create an exciting new exhibition with a sporting theme at the Winding House Museum in New Tredegar.

Staff at the museum are appealing for historic sporting equipment, old photographs or any other interesting objects that can be used in the exhibition with the theme ‘This Sporting Life’.

The exhibition will focus on the history of sport in the Caerphilly county borough – everything from rugby to cycling, boxing to handball and football to quoits. Local people are being urged to come forward with items they would be willing to loan or even donate for the exhibition.

Museums and Heritage Officer, Emma Wilson says, “Caerphilly County Borough has many unique sporting links. Obviously we can boast several famous sportsmen and women, like boxer Joe Calzaghe and rugby player Tom James but there are also some quirkier, less well-known sporting connections from the past. The exhibition will cover the achievements of sporting figures and their coaches, as well as focusing on the fan’s view and the agony and ecstasy that comes from following your team or sporting hero!

We are very keen to include as many photographs and objects relating to local people as we can. We would be delighted to accept either loans or donations to the museum collection – not just of photographs, but of sporting memorabilia such as sports kit, equipment, badges, programmes or trophies.

All objects and photographs will be carefully looked after during the exhibition and we are more than happy to arrange for photos to be scanned and copied if the owners do not want to loan their originals. We had a fantastic response from the local community with our previous exhibition on the Second World War, with nearly 4000 visitors since the exhibition launch in late August. The success of that exhibition wouldn’t have been possible without the generous loans and donations of many personal family items. We would be thrilled to have a similar response for our new exhibition on sport.”

“This Sporting Life” will open on Spring Bank Holiday, May 31st and will last for 9 months.

If you would like to donate or loan any objects or photographs for the exhibition – or if you have any sporting connections you would like to share – please e-mail Emma at the Winding House or call her on 01443 822 666.

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