A TYPICAL one up, one down, shoeworker's cottage could house part of a collection of Rushden bygones.
The museum is the brainchild of Rushden Amenities Society which hopes to remove a tiny stone and pantiled cottage from its present site and rebuild in the town centre.
Rushden businessman David Hamblin has redevelopment plans for land between High Street and Rectory Road and has agreed to include the museum, although the whole scheme still has to be given planning permission by East Northants Council.
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Mr Wood rings Buck's bell while putting a Victorian pewter tankard and stone footwarmer to good
use in his home
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Local historian and member of the amenities society Clive Wood said he hoped the scheme would be given the go-ahead. "We have a chance of keeping this cottage as a memento of old Rushden. We are not disclosing its location at present, but we have spoken with Mr Hamblin and he was amenable about including it in his re-development scheme.
"It is a very small cottage with no electricity or water supply. It has a workshop upstairs and the living accommodation must have been very cramped."
The amenities society already has some suitable artefacts which could go on display to recreate the working enviroment of shoemakers in the mid nineteenth century. They include an old clicking board — used for cutting the leather components of the shoe — and several original shoe samples. And the group also has another prize item from Rushden's past which could be a centrepiece of a museum collection — the original town crier's bell.
The prize exhibit has been donated to the Amenities Society by Miss Maud Stapleton, 91, who now lives in Hull but was formerly involved with the Rushden Independent Wesleyan Church. Miss Stapleton was given the bell by the former town crier Buck Turner after she borrowed it for various Sunday School concerts.
Mr Wood said: "Many older local people still remember Buck Turner. He had a catchphrase which many local people still use — "Don't say old Buck ain't told YOU."
"When we drew up a book of photographs of Old Rushden we were unable to find a picture of him and obviously now we have the bell we would be delighted to hear from anyone who has one."
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