Collection: Royal Air Force Museum

Collection-level records:

• Collection history (Collection development policy)

  The Museum was formally established under a Deed of Trust in 1965 and opened to the public on 15 November 1972. Little control was exercised over the quantity or quality of material accepted into the collections between 1965 and 1986. This was due to:

  • Enthusiasm to build the Museum’s collection from scratch.
  • A huge public response to the creation of the Museum leading to vastly more material being offered than the staff had capacity to appraise.
  • Acceptance of material in preference to risking giving offence.
  • Accepting poor examples as insurance against better ones never being offered.

  This resulted in several undesirable effects, primarily:

  • Continued acceptance of duplicated material.
  • Accrual of surplus objects because the Museum lacked a policy or procedure enabling their disposal.
  • A growing body of objects in need of identification and assessment.

  A more restrained collecting policy began to operate in 1986, although its parameters were not formally recorded. In 1994 a formal, general collection and disposal policy was compiled, but it was not actively applied until 1997 with the introduction of the Museum’s formal Collecting Statement.

  The Museum’s Inventory Project to record every object within our collections began in 1998 and informed collecting decisions as it went along. This can be viewed as the beginning of conscious and conscientious collecting at the Museum.

  Source: Collection development policy

  Date: 2021

  Licence: CC BY-NC

• Collection overview (Collection development policy)

  Collection Department	Objects – includes Permanent (accessioned), Inward Loans and Support (interpretive, surrogate, handling) collections
  Aircraft and Exhibits	55,000
  Archives	665,000
  Film and Sound	16,000
  Fine Art	7,000
  Library	206,000
  Photographs	151,353
  Total	1,305,000

  The Museum operates from two public sites, Colindale in North West London and Cosford in the West Midlands. The Museum also has collection stores on MOD premises at Stafford and Cosford.

  The Permanent Collection includes aircraft, personal equipment, uniforms, medals, film, photographs, fine art, publications and archive documents. In order to explain the full history of the service, these date from before the formation of the Royal Flying Corps in 1912 to the present day.

  The Museum’s Permanent Collection is acquired, stored and documented by specialist curators at the three sites detailed above. The following is an outline of the Permanent Collection material:

  Aircraft and Exhibits

  The A&E collection is dominated by aircraft-related material, such as airframe components and internal equipment (over 40,000 objects, including 233 complete airframes) and clothing (over 20,000 objects). Other notable sections include commemorative objects (3,500), medals (3,000) and survival equipment (3,000).

  The majority of the collection relates to the RAF’s first 50 years. Since 1965 material was largely collected on a type basis with proactive collecting limited to a relatively small number of specific purchases for exhibition. Objects relating to specific people and people stories are, therefore, limited and generally relate to senior RAF officers.

  Since 2016 the Museum has actively adopted a contemporary collecting focus to support the development of new exhibitions and as part of its Strategic Plan 2030 to reflect the diverse and whole history of the Royal Air Force. Acquiring further contemporary material will continue as one of the collecting priorities. Individual contemporary collecting projects may be proposed and undertaken by curatorial staff with defined outcomes, subject to approval by the Collections Development Committee.

  Archives

  The Museum is an approved Place of Deposit. Papers forming the Archive collection have been gathered from 1965 onwards with active collecting taking place since 1970. It incorporates drawings and technical papers (300,000), personal papers (200,000) and administrative records for the RAF Museum.

  The strength of the current collection lies with the material relating to the First and Second World War. The Inter-War period is reasonably represented but coverage of the Cold War era and recent decades is weak. A major strength of the collection overall is the personal papers of those who have served. This material includes objects relating to men and women of all ranks serving in numerous theatres.

  The material relating to the aerospace industry is one of the largest outside of the industry itself. The Archive also includes material which complements and supports objects held within the other Museum collections.

  Film and Sound

  The collection includes official RAF and Air Ministry training films, documentaries, amateur material shot by RAF personnel, films documenting trials of aircraft, weapons and other equipment and unedited footage from a variety of producers, including the RAF and MOD film units.

  The collection also includes a growing number of oral history recordings, documenting the memories and experiences of RAF personnel from the First World War to recent operations in Libya and Afghanistan. Areas already covered in this way include Cold War air defence, with emphasis on operations by Lightning and Phantom aircraft as well as transport flights by the RAF Lockheed Hercules fleet.

  Particular strengths of the collection include Second World War training and documentary films, footage produced by manufacturers during the 1940s and 1950s and material relating to the Cold War in Europe.

  Fine Art

  The art collection consists mainly of paintings (600), drawings and watercolours (3,900), prints and posters (2,400) and a smaller number of sculpture (90) and ceramic (four) works. It incorporates the War Artists Collection, comprising Second World War works from the official commissioning scheme of the War Artists Advisory Committee (WAAC), and the Air Ministry’s scheme (in total 400 works).

  The collection reflects many aspects of the service, its people, operational methodologies, noteworthy events, artists’ and institutional perspectives, and many other facets which cannot easily be put across by using other forms of museum object. It also provides a view of the RAF in colour, which photography cannot match in any quantity until the mid-1950s.

  Since the mid-1990s a policy of acquiring works which were painted at or close to the time during which particular events and RAF activities occurred has been pursued in favour of broadly commemorative works. Exceptions may be made for contemporary works which conceptually reflect back on the history of the RAF, raising questions of continuity and change.

  Library

  The collection consists of RAF publications used for operational, training, public relations or recreational purposes, commercial publications about RAF history, units, stations, equipment and personnel. These include large collections of books and periodicals (over 76,000), technical publications (70,000), maps and charts (13,000).

  The collection is a valuable source for supporting the Museum’s internal research activities, answering public enquiries and aids research into the history of the RAF.

  Photographs

  The collection primarily comprises photographs covering the first 50 years of the RAF’s existence. Most of the collection is made up of small collections from individuals, usually former service personnel or their families. There are a number of large collections, however, including Charles E Brown (photographer), British Aerospace, Kingston (aircraft manufacturer) and Jack Bruce (aviation historian).

  The collection is used to provide images for Museum exhibitions and commercial publications, in addition to aiding internal research and answering public enquiries.

  The Museum obtains images from many sources, including aerospace companies and other service providers working with the Royal Air Force. In certain circumstances material unsuitable for the Permanent Collection may be acquired for the Interpretative Collection, supporting exhibitions and other forms of interpretation.

  Source: Collection development policy

  Date: 2021

  Licence: CC BY-NC