Our Collections
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The Museum of East Anglian Life has a collection of over 40,000 objects, as well as photographs, books and ephemera. These items help tell the stories of life in the market town and surrounding East Anglian countryside as well as the impact of manufacturing and different forms of transport.
Some of our most popular collections include our grocer's shop with its old brands and packaging, our Victorian schoolroom with rows of desks and benches, and our home interiors from the 1900's and 1950's.
In contrast, we have a wide selection of machinery made or used in East Anglia. Special highlights include a wooden beamed Ransomes AY plough of 1869 used as a demonstration model at agricultural shows and a Woods wagon built in Stowmarket in 1894 and used by a local family for nearly 100 years.
On a larger scale, we have a number of working engines. These include the 'Empress of Britain'—our 1912 Burrell steam traction engine, a matched pair of Burrell steam ploughing engines—believed to be the only examples in preservation, and a pair of Walsh & Clark paraffin engines.