Dean Heritage Centre facts for kids
The Dean Heritage Centre is a fun place to visit in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, England. It's located in the beautiful valley of Soudley. This centre helps us remember and protect the history of the Forest of Dean and its people.
At the centre, you can explore a museum, a millpond with a working waterwheel, and a forester's cottage with a garden and animals. There are also art and craft displays, workshops, and trails through the woods. You can even enjoy picnic tables, barbecue spots, an adventure playground, a gift shop, and a restaurant called Heritage Kitchen.
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The Museum
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The museum has five main rooms, called galleries. They tell the story of the Forest of Dean from ancient times to today. You'll see many old objects from important local industries. These include coal and iron mining, forestry, timber, stone working, and clock making. These industries really shaped the area's history and landscape.
Some special items in the museum are an 1830s beam engine from a coal mine. There's also a detailed 1838 model of the Forest of Dean's geology, made by Thomas Sopwith. You can also see a collection of old longcase clocks from the 1700s and 1800s.
The Dean Heritage Museum Trust is a charity that started in 1979. People were worried that the Forest of Dean's history was being forgotten. So, the trust bought an old corn mill, called Camp Mill. They opened the museum there in 1983. The museum was updated in 2003 with help from the Heritage Lottery Fund.
Exploring the Setting
The museum has a lovely millpond. Water from this pond powers a restored waterwheel. The pond gets its water from a stream that flows from Morgan's Pool. Many birds live here, like mallard and mandarin ducks. You might also spot dippers, kingfishers, wagtails, and even a heron.
You can follow a forestry trail from the museum. It goes through very old oak and beech woods. The trail leads up to the top of Bradley Hill. From there, you get an amazing view of the valley. You can see the Zion Chapel, built in 1846, and an old railway tunnel from 1894.
Forester's Cottage, Garden, and Animals
In the museum grounds, there's a reconstructed forester's cottage from the early 1900s. It was carefully moved stone by stone from its original spot. The cottage is decorated like homes from the Victorian and Edwardian times.
Like many old Forest cottages, it has two rooms downstairs and two upstairs. Downstairs, there's a cozy sitting room with a harmonium and old china. There's also a kitchen with an old cast-iron stove. Upstairs, you'll find two bedrooms, including a children's room. Instead of wardrobes, they used chests to store clothes, just like people did back then. Outside, there's a wash-house with a copper for washing clothes, a washing dolly, and a mangle.
Behind the cottage is a garden. It grows old types of vegetables. The garden is also home to animals that Foresters traditionally kept. You'll see chickens for eggs and Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs. These pigs were raised for meat and would eat fallen apples under the trees. They were also let into the Forest to eat acorns in late summer. This old right is called pannage. Two ferrets also live in the garden. Foresters used ferrets to catch rabbits for food.
Charcoal Burners' Camp
You can also visit a charcoal burners’ camp at the centre. It's in a forest clearing with a hut made of stone and turf, just like they were built for centuries. Whole families used to camp in the Forest for months in summer. They needed to watch several charcoal burns at once.
The Heritage Centre still makes charcoal twice a year. They use the traditional method: wood is stacked tightly in a dome, then covered with turf and earth. This stops oxygen from getting in, so the wood dries out at a high temperature instead of burning. In the past, this charcoal was used to melt iron ore from the Forest. Today, it's mostly sold for barbecues.
Freemine Entrance
The Heritage Centre's five acres of woods also feature Harvey's Folly. This is a copy of a freemine entrance, built by a retired freeminer named Dave Harvey. The right to mine for coal in the Forest of Dean is very old. It's believed to have been given by Edward II. Any man born within the Forest's traditional boundaries (called the Hundred of St Briavels) who has worked underground for a year and a day can become a freeminer.
The Gage Library
The Gage Library opened in 1995. It's a great place to find information about the history of the Forest of Dean. It holds a large collection of books and papers given by Laurie Gage. He was a book dealer and generous person who loved the area. The library has over 1,500 books about the history, geography, and nature of the Forest of Dean and Wye Valley. It also has many old maps from the 1700s and papers from important local people.
Events
The museum has a busy calendar of events throughout the year. These include a Fire and Wood festival, Poacher's Day, Victorian Garden Day, Rural Skills Weekends, Apple Day, Fungi Day, and special family events during the summer holidays.
