There’s an exhibition at the County Hall Museum called Abingdon 1945.

It begins with displays tracing the progress of the Second World War from 1939 to 1945, and shows how everyday life in Abingdon was affected by the conflict, with exhibits on gas masks, air raid shelters, evacuees, blackouts, rationing, Dig for Victory gardens, and women taking on manual work at the MG factory and on local farms.

The exhibition then looks at the celebrations that followed the end of the war, with displays on VE Day and VJ Day in 1945. Street parties broke out spontaneously on May 8th, with dancing under the County Hall, and one airman climbed up to kiss Queen Victoria’s statue in the Market Place. In the weeks that followed, street parties were organised across the town. Abingdon was decorated for a grand Victory Parade on 7th August, which included a Fleet Air Arm and RAF fly-past. There were more street parties after VJ Day on 15th August. (The photo above shows residents of Winsmore Lane at their VJ party, as reported in the North Berks Herald.)

After the war, freedoms returned: you could switch on all the lights in the house and leave the curtains open, have a radio in your car, release a racing pigeon without police permission, buy a large-scale map, or sleep in an uncamouflaged tent.

But recovery took time. Rationing continued for several years. Housing was in short supply, and Abingdon saw experimental steel prefabricated homes made — with seven-foot-low ceilings. Many women gave up the jobs they had taken on during the war, returning to domestic or clerical work, while men were gradually demobbed or returned from prisoner-of-war camps and found new employment.

The County Hall Museum is run by Abingdon-on-Thames Town Council.

Abingdon Museum has an exhibition of old picture postcards. From the town centre to parks and historic landmarks, the postcards provides a view into Abingdon’s past.

The exhibition features a diverse collection of postcards, including images of local hotels, residential roads, schools, churches, almshouses, and the river. The museum has displayed the more interesting messages on the back of some of the postcards. Many come from Elizabeth Drury’s Collection.

The museum has also curated a large collection of historical photographs, projected onto a small screen.

The exhibition is scheduled to run until December 22, 2024. You can buy a postcard of Abingdon or the White Horse at the Museum Shop, send it to a friend and say, ‘Wish you were here’ – just like in the old days.

P.S: A selection of postcards from my old collection can be seen on the internet at from my postcard collection blog. The only Abingdon one however is a French lady with an HMS Abingdon sailors hat.

From Saturday 6th July to Sunday 29th September, Abingdon County Hall Museum will take you back to the Iron Age!

Before the Romans, from around 50 BC to 50 AD, where the centre of Abingdon is now, there was a protected settlement called an ‘Oppidum‘ (Latin for Town). Iron Age Oppidum towns could be surrounded by ditches for fortification. When people were excavating near the old station and near West St Helen Street, they found what they thought were Oppidum-style ditches.

Before developing the Ashville Trading Estate in Abingdon, archaeologists discovered an even older Iron Age settlement that pre-dated the Oppidum.

At the exhibitions are information boards to explain:
* Iron Age
* Iron Age Abingdon before the Oppidum
* Abingdon’s ‘Oppidum’
* Iron Age Coins
* Weapons and a sword found in the Thames
* Jewellery, skin decoration, and clothes
* Pottery
* Food
* Rituals and burials

There’s also a video about recent discoveries near Wittenham Clumps where iron slag and iron offcuts could be evidence of an Iron Age blacksmith.