Women in Tunbridge Wells: A Hidden History

Tunbridge Wells Museum and Art Gallery (TWMAG)'s mission statement commits it to enriching the 'lives of all the people of the Borough of Tunbridge Wells by sharing their collections in participative experiences through which they can learn, enjoy and be inspired'. TWMAG is an Accredited Museum which makes imaginative use of its temporary exhibition space (the Art Gallery), its outreach programme and its website to contribute to the 'learning society' in the locality. TWMAG is committed to telling the stories of the people of Tunbridge Wells, aiming - as its Collections Management Plan states - 'to document the life of sections of the community whose story may be under-represented by traditional history' and wishing to promote research and understanding of 'untold stories (hidden histories), new ways of telling familiar stories and new configurations of known data'. Moreover TWMAG has a desire to achieve 'the widest possible public access to... collections, both on-site and remotely'. It has initiated an award-winning education and outreach programme with activities for schools linked to the National Curriculum as well as for families and adults. However, most of the schools activities have been linked to the primary school curriculum; therefore TWMAG is keen to develop its service for older pupils. Dr Anne Logan, who works at the Medway campus of the University of Kent, is a specialist in British women's history, including the history of feminist movements. In addition to researching national campaigns, Dr Logan has undertaken an investigation of the (arguably unique) women's movement of the West Kent area. Although in general women can no longer be said to be 'hidden from history', within the context of the conventional narrative of Tunbridge Wells' history, with its concentration on the development of the built environment and on a handful of elite personalities, the activities of women in the town - where a century ago they made up a majority of the population - remain remarkably obscure. Dr Logan's research, presented in local talks and in academic publications, has begun to reveal a 'hidden history' and has the potential, via transfer of knowledge, to alter perceptions of the town's past. Dr Logan has wide experience of teaching from GCSE to postgraduate level and is in a position to offer advice on the development of learning resources. The project aims to transfer knowledge to TWMAG to provide the basis for a temporary exhibition in the Art Gallery and a more permanent online exhibition, both to be accompanied by teaching and learning resources. This knowledge will also contribute in the longer term to new permanent displays in TWMAG's projected redevelopment. Dr Logan and a research assistant will assist TWMAG staff in the realization of the physical and virtual exhibitions around the theme 'Women in Tunbridge Wells: a Hidden History'. Under Dr Logan's direction the research assistant will identify items for display both from within the TWMAG collection and elsewhere (for example the Women's Library) and provide input for interpretation panels. The research assistant will also engage in the preparation of teaching and learning resources to be made available online for teachers and pupils in Key Stages 3, 4 and 5 studying history and/or citizenship. The resources will be designed not only to inform knowledge of early 20th century political and social history (including, but not restricted to women's suffrage) but also to facilitate understanding of several cross-curricular and citizenship themes: social exclusion, citizens' rights and duties, the volunteer and the State, civil disobedience, and care for refugees. There will also be materials for learning and teaching generic historical skills, such as evaluation of primary sources and understanding of quantitative data. The project will therefore assist TWMAG in meeting its objectives with regard to outreach and also widen public knowledge of women's history.

Beneficiaries of the project are likely to be:
1. Teachers and secondary school pupils in the West Kent and East Sussex areas, as well as further afield, particularly those involved in teaching and learning History and Citizenship
2. The local community in the Tunbridge Wells area
3. The Tunbridge Wells Museum and Art Gallery (TWMAG) and users
4. The Women's Library and users
Teachers and students should benefit from the availability of the teaching and learning resources, both for those who visit the exhibition and those who use the online materials.
Both the physical and the virtual exhibitions will be of interest to students studying certain GCSE and GCE syllabuses, for example Edexcel GCE AS level Unit 2, option C2, and any other options covering early 20th century Britain. The resources will also relate to aspects of the Key stage 3 history curriculum, including the utilisation and evaluation of historical sources. The exhibition's themes are also resonant for pupils in this stage, encompassing history at the local, national and international levels and focusing particularly on the development of democracy (universal suffrage) and on the local impact of international events (the First World War).
For pupils and teachers of Citizenship at Key Stage 4 the exhibition and accompanying resources will provide opportunities to explore the key concepts of democracy and justice, rights and responsibilities, identities and diversity, and participation.
It is also hoped that the project, particularly the physical exhibition, would be of interest to the wider community and promote awareness among the general public of the history of the area and its national and international significance. As the TWMAG Collection Management Plan states, 'the borough of Tunbridge Wells has a special nature which has grown out of its unusual story'. The project aims to tell a part of that hitherto neglected and under-reported story: the probably unique role played by women in the town's development at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. The exhibition is timed to take place exactly a century after the peak years of the women's suffrage movement, and just under one hundred years since the outbreak of the First World War, and should therefore attract interest from the media and in turn the general public.
TWMAG would benefit from the project as a result of the furtherance of some of its objectives set out in its Collection Management Plan, for example in 'contributing to the learning society in Tunbridge Wells' and in increasing TWMAG capacity for education and outreach work, especially among older school pupils. It is also expected that in the long term the knowledge transfer project will contribute to new, permanent displays for the museum, as envisaged in the TWMAG redevelopment brief.
The project is planned to take place with the co-operation of the Women's Library, which in 2003 became the repository of the personal papers of Amelia Scott, a leading figure during the early 20th century not only in the local politics of Tunbridge Wells, but also in the National Council of Women of Great Britain and Ireland. The Women's Library can benefit from the project's ability to interpret the items in its collection and from the heightened public profile that its involvement with the project has the potential to provide.