Digitising volunteer, Ingrid Babbidge, talks about her role in the Shippam's project, and what attracted her to get involved.
I’m a digitising volunteer, one of four on The Novium’s Shippam’s project. We are here every other week as part of a wider team digitising, cataloguing, and repacking objects from the Shippam’s archive. We are currently working on some very striking, mid-century, shop advertising.
Growing up, I was always a museum visitor with my family, whether near home in Hampshire or when holidaying. If we weren’t finding out about naval ships or family history, we were having a go at archaeology. It was no surprise that after studying Textile Art, I stayed on at Winchester School of Art for an MA in Museums and Galleries. After working front-of-house in a variety of different Winchester museums, I later concentrated on both a textiles career and my busy young family.
The Novium has been our local museum now for many years and a trip always holds something new, from blasting off in Tim Peake’s space lift (and dressing up as an astronaut), to pretending we are taking a dip in the bath house and spending lots of time in the ever-popular LEGO exhibitions.
When I saw the call for volunteers to work on the Shippam’s project in The Novium’s newsletter I was intrigued.
My mother-in-law had mentioned to me once that she had been to Shippam’s on a school trip, which I thought an unusual place to visit, but she also went to the sewage works on a trip - it was the 1950s! My own memories of Shippam’s (or Princes as I remembered the company latterly) were mostly as 1980s paste sandwiches, and the factory on Terminus Road. However, my mother-in-law had lots of memories of fun advertising, local events, and bringing home a wishbone from the factory tour with her school.
There was clearly a lot more to Shippam’s than I thought… I decided to apply and was very pleased to be assigned a digitisation role.
Having spent a significant portion of my earlier career working in museums, I had found myself missing that environment and especially the hands-on work. My more recent work has been in a freelance capacity, and working by myself, so I’m thoroughly enjoying being part of a group again. It’s lovely being able to reconnect with the museum community, apply and brush up on my skills in a meaningful way, and contribute work on such an interesting project.
Since starting at the beginning of June, I have been scanning and adding information to the catalogue along with my teammate Holly. At the same time, other members of our morning team repack and catalogue on the other side of the room, all overseen by Shippam’s Project Officer, Sally.
It’s early days, but we are encountering some wonderful designs - each time we open a box there is something different to see. Shippam’s were very innovative with their advertising, and there is much more to selling meat and fish paste than you can possibly imagine - just wait until you see the exhibition next year! But for now, as a taster, you can visit the first floor of the museum to see three fascinating display cubes of Shippam’s objects that start to tell the story.
I’m really enjoying playing my small part in the wider project and seeing where it goes!
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