| Over the years the town has grown to now contain almost 40 Victorian exhibits. These have generally been created in four different ways. |
| By rescuing buildings, machinery or objects at risk. Examples of this practice include the Duke of Sutherland Cottage, Stirchley Board School, the Blowing Engines David & Sampson and the last remaining Severn Trow, the “Spry”. |
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| The school in its original location. |
A brick by brick re-erection. Stirchley Board School, originally built in 1881 rebuilt and re opened at Blists Hill in 1992. |
| By re-using existing buildings on site collections can be displayed more appropriately. The Foundry at Blists Hill is a typical example of this. Originally the building was a drying shed for the nearby Brickworks in about 1900. Foundry items from various sources have been brought together under its roof and today it produces a wide range of iron castings, just as a small jobbing foundry of 1900 would have done. |
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| Pouring molten iron in Blists Hill Foundry. |
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| Other buildings which have been converted to house new trades include a complex of brick warehouses which now house a tinsmiths and plumbers shop. |
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| Adaptive re-use of a building. The Blists Hill Tinsmiths and Plumbers shops. |
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| Occasionally it has not been possible to find an existing building to move/rescue or re-use to house a collection. In this instance the museum has created replicas of buildings that still exist elsewhere and which are therefore more appropriate to the collection. Lloyds Bank is an accurate copy of a bank still standing to the South of the river Severn in Broseley. Similarly, A F Blakemore & Son, Grocers is a copy of a still existing building in Oakengates. |
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| Blists Hill Grocers shop. |
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| Blists Hill Bank |
Broseley Bank as it is today |
| Blists Hill has seen two hundred years of heavy industry due to the mineral wealth which lies under its grounds. The first known industrial activity on the site was mining which began in the late eighteenth century. One of the first tasks which the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust undertook at Blists Hill was the recreation of a winding engine house and the partial reopening of a shaft originally sunk in the 1770’s. Using a rescued engine from the Ironbridge, Milburgh Tileries the museum has been operating this exhibit almost everyday since 1973. |
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| The interior of the Blists Hill Winding Engine today |
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| Substantial parts of the Brick & Tile Works which once covered the whole of the top part of Blists Hill still remain. During the course of an ambitious programme to repair and consolidate the existing industrial remains during the 1990’s the Brick & Tile Works on the east side of the canal were made accessible to visitors. The eventual intention is to bring these works back into operation. |
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| Blists Hill Brick & Tile Works |
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| There are, of course exceptions to the four main areas outlined. The wrought ironworks for example is not the result of one rescue operation but two, which have been successfully joined to create a single exhibit. The building is an 1815 cast-iron framed smithy building from the Woolwich dockyard, whilst the machinery and furnaces housed within are from Walmsley’s Atlas works in Bolton. |
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| The Blists Hill Ironworks. |
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