How to contribute
What we are seeking
In time we hope to set up a collection process for digital archive: watch this space if you have film and video records.
The material could include items from other countries, from Remain campaigners and pro-EU groups, and material from the EU itself (eg the Raspberry Ice Cream War). We want to tell the full story. It’s a big one.
Please do remember some key details though. In particular, whatever is donated needs to come with a donation record. You can find that on a separate page on this website: just print it out, fill it in, and put it with the items. If there is more than one item and story to tell, then please fill out more than one form. We want to capture as much of the history as possible.
The following list is not exhaustive but might give you some ideas of what to look for in your loft;
- Relevant photographs
- Unique items, for instance, a draft speech from the Maastricht debate
- Symbolic items like placards, badges, posters, and campaign rosettes
- Personal items that come with a story
- Items associated with an event, such as a folding desk and associated street stall display from a specific campaign visit
Archives and printed literature, some of which would be important enough to go on display, could include
- Personal correspondence
- Diaries
- Books on the EU
- Pamphlets
- Campaign literature
Please do
- Box items (if in any quantity) to help preserve them, and keep them together: ideally, in a robust and stackable cardboard box.
- Fill in a donation record, so we can record for posterity the full story behind each item – one for each plastic bag, or item of high significance.
- Be patient! This is the work of volunteers.
- Chip in as a proactive 'chaser' if you have spare time. We would welcome people chasing around friends, contacts, associates, and old adversaries for material that can be sent on to us.
- Send us leaflets and books from all sides of the Brexit debate: we want to record the full story - and that applies across all the years and not just what happened in 2016.
Please don't
- Send us lots of identical items. If you think there might be a good reason to do so, drop us a line first.
- Send a massive collection – such as the complete forty years run of a review – without first checking: we might already have the complete collection but are missing an edition from just one month. (At present this is rare.)
- Expect anyone to rock up at your garage tomorrow with a van. Please look at our section below on how to contribute items: it might mean working out when someone you know might be passing Vauxhall or West Bromwich with space in their car boot in a few weeks’ time.
- Don't expect the museum to be up and running any time soon. It will take years. But getting the wheels turning now gives us a chance of capturing the key artefacts, memories, and stories before they are lost to time
Don’t forget to add a short donation record (see below) to capture the background. Feel free to type up a tale if there’s more to tell.
How to contribute items
QUICK ANSWER: If it can fit through a small letterbox, you can just post it to the chairman Dr Lee Rotherham at 9, Jameson House, Glasshouse Walk, London SE11 5EX
Otherwise…
OPTION 1
If what you have will fit into a jiffy bag or something the Post Office can handle but a small letterbox might not, you can email us telling us what it is and we can give you an alternative postal address – and you can then just pop it in the post.
OPTION 2
We originally set up 50 county drop off points around the country to make bulk drop offs easier, and this received significant media coverage at the time. However, these have now been collapsed into the two central storage sites – one in Vauxhall in Central London and the other in West Bromwich.
These are still open for deliveries but we do need advanced warning so someone is there to collect. The material needs to be robustly boxed up.
OPTION 3
If you or any friend with a car are unlikely to be in either West Bromwich or London any time, contact us and we can discuss getting it delivered to London by a courier like DHL or similar. If costs are a factor we do have a small dedicated budget to potentially cover this, but we do need a discussion first and don’t accept blind deliveries.
Drop-off submission form
We are volunteers so please bear with us for any delays, though do contact us directly if we haven’t got back to you after any reasonable delay.
Similarly, if you have a large library on the EU that you no longer have space for, or have found a copy of the Magna Carta in your attic, do contact us directly on the email listed below so we can cover special arrangements. (We share the email with a think tank but it is regularly monitored.)