Expansion underway for National Museum
Where in the world is there a museum where you can watch a Test match?At the National Cricket Museum at the Basin Reserve in Wellington you can. And big plans are about to be realised to make New Zealand’s only cricket museum an up to date interactive experience.The chairman of the Board of Trustees, Don Neely sees the institution, which was opened on November 29, 1987, “developing into quite a sizeable museum.”Neely said: “It will never match the MCG, or be as steeped in history as Lord’s, but we have a mission statement to look after everything. We archive and preserve everything. It’s all tissue paper and waxed boxes. After all, we only get one chance.”Under the old Grandstand lies acres of unused space that the $220,000 needed for the expansion will develop before England play in the Test in March.Many years ago New Zealand Cricket Almanack Editor Arthur Carman showed Neely, then Wellington captain around the dungeons, of the 1920s building, which had fallen largely out of use even then.”Water was up to here,” Neely recalled, pointing to his knees. “Wisdens were floating, ruined.”This is why I will never leave anything to Wellington cricket,” said Carman, whose memory is perpetuated with the Arthur Carman Press Box at the ground.It has all changed now at the Museum. Curator Stan Cowman, archivist Donal Duthie, enthusiast Adrienne Simpson, and many more volunteers have struggled for years to keep the under-funded house of treasures afloat.In the last 10 years alone 285 boxes and suitcases of artefacts, including John Reid’s entire collection of albums, clothes and trophies have been catalogued, preserved and displayed when space allows.Now the money required to make a large safe storage area, a theatrette, an interactive room and a display of cricket clothing in the old function rooms beneath the long-abandoned marble staircase that visiting dignitaries were guided up to the best seats before the war.In the style of those pre-war days Martin Donnelly’s book collection will be displayed in the style of an English gentleman’s library, alongside the museum’s own collection of volumes.And that’s just the start. In a city that boasts Te Papa, the main drive of the National Cricket Museum will be similar to that great attraction – for educational purposes. Computer terminals designed for school groups to research recent events in cricket history.”Too many museums round the world stop in 1949.” Neely is referring to Bowral, where the Bradman Museum halts after the Don retired.”What happened here two years ago when [Mathew] Sinclair got his 214 on debut – that’s history. CricInfo is writing history everyday,” says Neely, author of Men in White, the history of international cricket in New Zealand.Work started before the Boxing Day Bangladesh Test. It will be unveiled in front of an audience of well-known players and the international media during the England Test.