If you find yourself in Yorkshire, UK, you should make a trip to Eden Camp. This immersive history museum takes its visitors on a journey back in time. By recreating the sights, sounds, stories, and smells of the past, Eden Camp helps kids better understand life during wartime Britain.
Today, we’ll go behind the scenes with the museum’s manager, Nick Hill. Nick has kindly answered our questions about Eden Camp and all the work that goes into creating a “living” history experience.
Tell us about your job as a Museum Manager. What does a typical day look like?
A normal working day should be 9:00 am start and 5:00 pm finish. However, in the Heritage tourism industry “typical” working days don’t tend to be the norm: whether it be working late prepping for a special event, preparing for Living History weekends and Veterans reunions, or acting as “Night Watchman” for a Paranormal Investigation (“Ghost Hunt”) which are very popular at the moment.
Probably the worst situation is when a visitor reports to you at 4:30 pm that “my car has broken down in your carpark and the AA says it will be a couple of hours before they can get to us….is that OK?” So it’s never really a good idea to make plans around a 9–5 working day.
That said, one of the most enjoyable aspects of my job is the variety—no one day is ever the same as another.
I often arrive at work with great intentions to clear my desk of the general day-to-day documentation and paperwork associated with running a commercial business, (we are fairly unique in the world of museums in that we are privately owned and funded and therefore operate just like any other commercial business), but by the end of the day the paperwork is still sat on my desk, having been called away to undertake jobs and tasks which were never on my expected day to day schedule.
I, like most of our full-time staff, wear many hats (or should we say tin helmets?). Whether it be spending time with a veteran visitor who is looking to donate something to the museum or just wants to share their story, putting a lunch break shift in on our Admissions desk meeting and greeting visitors, checking in arriving school groups (a two-man job when we have 500 students passing through a day during our peak school visit periods), or becoming Dan the Air Raid Precautions (ARP) man and Helmut the German Prisoner of War Interpreter on our Living History event days and weekends.
What would you say is the most fun or interesting aspect of your work? What would you say is the most challenging?
Fun: Seeing the enjoyment our site and exhibitions bring to visitors of all generations. Also getting younger visitors involved when I am Dan the ARP man—sounding the air raid siren, getting them to shout at the audience to “put that light out”, encouraging them to squirt the audience when putting out an incendiary bomb with a stirrup pump, sounding the Gas Attack warning rattle, and ringing the Gas All Clear hand bell.
Nick Hill as “Dan the ARP man” with a young visitor. Image courtesy of Eden Camp.
Interesting: Meeting veterans who have served in HM Forces over the last 100 years and hearing their stories and experiences. Also, meeting those who have served in a civilian capacity during periods of conflict—whether it be serving in the Women’s Land Army, the ARP/Civil Defense, the Auxiliary and National Fire Services, the Women's Voluntary Service, Red Cross, St John or a whole raft of other organizations.
Challenging: Finding the space to preserve and present as many unique stories and experiences of those who have served their King/Queen and country as possible and ensuring that every visitor leaves with a positive experience when considering that much of what we portray relates directly to the horrors of war and conflict.
Can you tell us an interesting fact about Eden Camp that most visitors wouldn’t know?
There were never any Guard Towers at Eden Camp when it was a Prisoner of War camp between 1942 and 1948. Back in the late 1980s, when we first opened to visitors, it was perceived that most visitors' expectations of visiting a Prisoner of War Camp would be to see Guard Towers.
The towers which we built also acted as a bit of a landmark and visual draw across the open fields for folks traveling down the A169, which connects Pickering and the gateway of the North York Moors National Park to the main road that runs east to west across North Yorkshire (A64). It was very important to try and get as many folks as possible to turn off the A169 to come and have a closer look at what we were doing and hopefully persuade them to make a visit.
Thirty-seven years on (and sadly a sign of the times we now live in) they provide an aesthetically convenient mount for some of our CCTV security cameras, and provide secure nesting platforms for some of our resident birds of prey, collared doves, and woodpigeons.
Guard tower and planes on display at Eden Camp.
Image courtesy of Eden Camp.
How did you first become interested in history?
Having parents who were both teachers, and living in the north of England, family holidays would always include an educational element—whether it be walking an ancient Roman road, or visiting a Roman fort, a castle, or a museum.
Like most young lads growing up in the 1970s, I liked playing with Action Men and toy soldiers and then progressed to making model kits of tanks, fighter aircraft, and battleships. Moving into my teens, my model making became more serious (as the kits became more expensive!) I researched battles, camouflage and color-schemes, regiments, and squadrons and created dioramas into which I could incorporate the models I was making.
In your opinion, what sets Eden Camp apart from other museums?
To quote Stan Johnson, whose vision it was to create the first modern history theme museum in the world and turn a dilapidated ex-WWII Prisoner of War camp into a tourist attraction, “I created this museum to pay tribute to and honor the courage, fortitude and sacrifice of the people who served in all walks of life during the Second World War.”
We have always referred to ourselves as the People's Museum: about the “ordinary” people who all pulled together and did what was asked during Britain’s “Hour of Need.”
Stan was one of the first to break away from a traditional museum setup by taking inanimate objects out of glass showcases and giving them a new life by incorporating them into life size-scenes and scenarios which provide visitors with a 360 degree “living” history experience.
Thirty-seven years later, we are proud of a common comment passed on by many visiting teachers that “…an hour spent at Eden Camp is worth ten hours in the classroom in terms of bringing the subject of WWII to life and getting students interested and enthusiastic for the subject.”
Nick Hill showing a young visitor how to sound the air raid siren. Image courtesy of Eden Camp.
Are there any upcoming projects that you can share with us?
Shortly we shall be closing our gates to visitors for the season, which will allow us to concentrate on refurbishing a couple of our existing exhibition huts as well as adding new displays and exhibitions. Much of the inspiration for new exhibitions and displays still comes from the items and accounts that visitors bring in and donate or leave on loan.
We like to think that we specialize in telling the stories and pay tribute to the organizations, groups, and individuals who don’t have a “shop window” anywhere else. This has resulted in us acquiring items of memorabilia and creating displays that are unique and which you will not see anywhere else in the world.
Our biggest winter project is the refurbishment of our Churchill Crocodile flamethrower tank: one of “Hobart's Funnies” which was specially developed and built for the D-Day landings.
We will also be unveiling a display dedicated to the Army Film and Photography Unit (AFPU) whose job is to capture and record the British Army’s role during conflict. It is a small but unique group of individuals who are always at the forefront of any fighting and capture the action as it happens.
Do you have any advice for kids interested in history or who would like to work for a museum one day?
Whilst it is good to specialize in a particular period or subject, I would always recommend you keep your interests, and therefore knowledge-base, quite broad. With a love for 20th-century British military history, I was fortunate to be in the right place at the right time. I had undertaken a 10-week placement as a student studying Recreation Management and landed my dream job in a WWII museum.
Having a broad base of historical knowledge will hopefully allow you to find work within the Heritage/Museums industry, with the hope that one day your dream job might become available.
The fact that you are already working in the industry should be a big tick on your CV for any prospective employer interviewing you for your dream job.
If you could travel back in time, what time would you go to?
As a fan of “Good Night Sweetheart”, which was a BBC TV series that ran from 1993 to 1999 about a character (Gary Sparrow played by Nicholas Lydhurst) who time traveled to and from 1940s London, I would have to say World War II. Like Gary, I could relive the period, but with secret knowledge to ensure that I was never in direct and imminent danger or confronted with the true horrors of war.
Want to learn more about Eden Camp? Check out our interview with the museum’s archivist here for another behind-the-scenes look. And if you're looking for more WWII resources, don't forget our kids magazine! Issue 20 | From the Battlefront dives into often-untold stories of the Second World War.