Church Farmhouse Museum MM

House on a Hill: 350 Years of Church Farm, Hendon

29 May- 19 September 2010

2010 is the 350th anniversary of Church Farm, the oldest surviving house in Hendon, and now London Borough of Barnet’s museum. The Museum is marking the tersemicentenary with an exhibition and other events.

The exhibition recounts the long and varied history of the building- as a dwelling, as the centre of a big hay and dairy farm, and as a museum.

Associated events include a ‘Living History Day’ (generously funded by the Friends of the Museum) in the Museum garden in August, with re-enactments of scenes from everyday life in the 1600s; an evening of 17th Century music; and a series of talks (at Hendon Library), setting Church Farm in the context of local and national history.

Hendon & District Archaeological Society and University College, London Institute of Archaeology, with pupils from local schools, will be excavating in the Museum garden in July; then the archaeologists will move on to uncover the WWII public air-raid shelters close by in Sunny Hill Park. (A selection of finds from previous digs at Church Farm will be included in the exhibition.)

Children visiting are invited to draw or paint the Museum, and we shall display their pictures during the Summer. There are also new displays within our exhibition of playthings past, The Moving Toyshop.

Dates and details of the events will be posted here shortly. Please come and join us as we celebrate the first 350 years of this splendid building.

A small display of dolls in traditional costumes from around the world, from Scotland to South Africa, from Jamaica to Japan. The collection has kindly been put on loan by a Barnet borough resident.

Church Farm’s continuing exhibition of 20th Century toys and games is based on the extensive private collections of Friends of the Museum Irene & Mark Cornelius and Brenda Faris. It will feature new displays of teddy bears, dolls and dolls’ houses this Summer, and there is now a Teddy Bear Trail for children to follow through the Museum’s Victorian kitchen, laundry room and dining room.

As well as toys and games for the very young to play with, the exhibition now gives an opportunity for older children to make their own models out of Lego or Lott’s Bricks.(Lott’s Bricks were made nearby in Bushey, Hertfordshire, and were one of the most popular construction toys of the 1930s.)