UK Museum of Computing shuts up shop and puts history into storage

Davey Winder
Friday, 04 July 2008 17:35

Your IT - Home IT

The first museum in the UK dedicated entirely to the history of computing has been forced to put its exhibits into storage. Does this mean that the museum will itself become just a footnote in the history of British computing? Or is it just the start of a new era, as the National Museum of Computing opens its doors at Bletchley Park, home to the wartime code breaking Colossus machines...


If you do not count the Science Museum in London, which has a much broader remit, then the Museum of Computing in Swindon can claim to be the first museum in the UK devoted to the history of computers and related technology.

Launched in 2003, the museum has been a great example of a typically British, run on a shoestring, volunteer staffed institution. Don't let that description fool you. With more than 2000 hardware exhibits covering pretty much the entire history of computing, at least 85 percent of them restored to full working order, the museum is nothing if not serious about what it does.

With no public funding, and instead relying entirely upon public donations and the work of a team of dedicated volunteers, it has somehow managed to collect 2500 items of software and 1500 books, manuals and magazines. All of historical interest.

Distinguished names in the visitors book include Sir Clive Sinclair and HRH The Duke of Kent. Not forgetting, of course, the members of the public who have visited in their thousands over the years. Schools have been amongst the most welcomed of these, with kids being able to experience the birth of video gaming through working exhibits as well as discovering the roots of the technology they all take for granted in the classroom.

So why has it closed and is this the end of the museum for good? read on to find out...

CONTINUED