Top honour given to Biggar's museum volunteers

Biggar Museum receives Queen's Award for Volunteers

(from left to right) Lady Haughey, and June Irwin and Blane Duncan receiving the Award on behalf of all the museum volunteers. — Biggar Museum receives Queen's Award for Volunteers (from left to right) Lady Haughey, and June Irwin and Blane Duncan receiving the Award on behalf of all the museum volunteers.

Those involved in setting up the new Biggar and Upper Clydesdale Museum have won the ultimate accolade for their commitment and hard work '“ the Queen's Award for Volunteers.

The award, the most prestigious of its kind, was presented at a gathering in the High Street museum last Wednesday by Lady Susan Haughey, deputy lord-lieutenant of Lanarkshire.

It is the latest in a line of awards won by the museum.

The £2.2m community project was opened by the Princess Royal in October 2015 and within months had secured a five-star rating from VisitScotland and a national enterprising museum award.

Last week, Blane Duncan and June Irwin accepted its new award, a certificate signed by the Queen and an engraved glass trophy, on behalf of all their fellow volunteers.

Blane has had responsibility for maintaining the museum’s buildings for many years, and June works in its archives as well as front of house and in the museum shop.

Thanking Lady Haughey ,James Dawnay, chairman of the Biggar Museum Trust, reiterated the enormous importance of the 50-plus volunteers without whose commitment the museum would be unable to function.

Their work covers conservation and cataloguing of its extensive collections, fundraising and accounting, ongoing building maintenance, special events and outreach educational programmes and manning its front counter.