Museum highlights lives of Emsworth women
EMSWORTH’S WOMEN, a temporary exhibition in Emsworth Museum (10b North Street, PO10 7DD), opened on 31st May. The museum’s chairman, Trevor Davies, was keen to highlight the lives of local women and approached Phoebe Atkinson to curate the exhibition. Phoebe now admits that her first look through the museum archives was disappointing: “Having decided to concentrate on women of the twentieth century, I could only find useful information about seven or eight women within the museum’s collection.”
Fast forward to May 2025 and thanks to the help of friends and families, the exhibition has stories about more than forty women from all sorts of backgrounds. Each one of them has made a difference to Emsworth. “The variety of lives lived, and legacies left is just wonderful” says Phoebe.
Trevor is delighted that so many women’s lives are now going to be a part of the museum’s collection: “This exhibition was always meant to be the start of something, rather than the end.The hope is that visitors will come along to the exhibition and add to the information we have been able to gather, and possibly bring more women to our attention.”
Women profiled cover every imaginable walk of life, from landed gentry to the local nit nurse; from a local fundraiser to an internationally acclaimed archaeologist; from laundry workers to nuns.
The exhibition opened on Saturday, 31st May at 10:30am and runs for six weeks until 6th July. The museum is open on Saturdays from 10:30am – 4:30pm and on Sundays from 1:30pm – 4:30pm. Admission is free.