It’s the Spalding family-run museum led by an 89-year-old which is still attracting people from all around the world in its 30th year.
The Gordon Boswell Romany Museum is back open from Friday to Sundays throughout the summer for a special 2025.
The Clay Lake institution was officially opened on February 25, 1995 on what would have been Gordon’s dad Sylvester’s 100th birthday.
Gordon died in 2016 but the family, led by his widow Margaret, are continuing to run the museum they literally built themselves.
“Everything you see has been collected and maintained over the years,” said Margaret. “The Romany people moved out of wagons in the 1920s and 1930s, but we’ve been able to restore a few of them.”
Among the exhibits is a wagon owned by actors Sir John and Lady Mary Mills who wrote her novel Whistle Down the Wind in it.
There’s also one previously owned by Dave Peacock, of music duo Chas and Dave, who meticulously helped family members paint another Bradford Flat Cart on display.
He also officially opened the building 30 years ago.
It’s all in buildings put up by the family over the years after numerous extensions.
The museum even includes its own mini-theatre and tea room.
Margaret doesn’t hesitate when asked which is her favourite bit of memorabilia – the open wagon she and Gordon used to make the two-week, 280-mile horse drawn trip to Cumbria and the Appleby Fair.
“I must have done thousands of miles in that,” she said. “I call it my second home.”
She’s not been back to Appleby, famous for its annual traveller fair, since Gordon’s death.
And much of the point of the museum is about passing on the details of the Romany way of life from previous generations.
“We don’t want future generations to forget about the traditions,” said Lenda Boswell, Margaret’s daughter and ‘right hand man’. “We want them to be proud of where the come from.
“It’s something I’ve grown up with.
“People have always said how much they’d like to come and see the wagons up close and that’s partly why it was set up.
“People come in as strangers and leave as friends.
“We find talking to people, many have relatives who had links to Romany people but they’ve often denied it because of levels of persecution that have been against us.”
“People come from all over,” says Margaret. “Two weeks ago we had a coach load from Belgium but they’re certainly not the furthest people have come.
“We’ve had people from Australia and America.
“Last year we had a couple from Norway turn up as they’d seen us on Antiques Road Trip.
“They told me as soon as they’d seen it they had to come, and they came and announced ‘now we are here’.”
Another TV experience led to a knock on the door from the police.
When the program Crimewatch was staging a reconstruction of the theft of a wagon, they asked Gordon’s son, also called Gordon, to tow one down to be used in the filming.
He did just that, only to be spotted by an eagle-eyed viewer driving back from the Shepherd’s Bush studios who misidentified it as the one that actually was stolen.
“The police saw the funny side when I invited them in to see the wagon that had been on TV,” said Gordon.
Margaret’s showing no sign of slowing down at 89 and very much leads all the tasks including not inconsiderable task of keep everything looking so immaculate.
“I’m just keeping active,” she continued. “I’m someone who just can’t sit still.”
“I don’t think any of us are,” continued Lenda. “There are always jobs to do.”
For more on the Gordon Boswell Romany Museum visit www.gordonboswell
romanymuseum.com/
