National Telephone Kiosk Museum

Sometimes you come across the unexpected at museums. Having stopped over at Redditch for the Midland Air Festival (see the In Reach Blog) we had some time to spare the next day before heading home so decided to call in at the nearby Avonscroft Museum which houses a collection of relocated buildings of historical importance that would likely have been lost to developers. Before we had really even started looking around we noticed a sign to a collection of telephone kiosks and went for a quick look. We ended up chatting with a former BT engineer who had previously worked at Brooklands museum and found that Avonscroft holds the National Collection of phone kiosks representing at least one of every box that has been in use since 1912, a number of roadside boxes and a working exchange which is connected to all of the individual phones so, yes, they all work.

If like me you are of a certain age you will remember many of these boxes so it was a little nostalgia trip as well as being interesting, as was the exchange which was demonstrated to us by the nice chap at the museum. Sparing no expense we were also given a souvenir post card of the Queen launching direct long distance calling back in 1958. At least that happened before I was born!