On 15 and 16 August, the Travelling Pharology Archive made its second public appearance, this time at Harwich Maritime Museum.

Set beside the historic Low Lighthouse, it was a particularly fitting place to continue testing the Archive. Across the weekend, visitors explored stories connected to lighthouse and maritime heritage, from Henry Winstanley and the Eddystone Lighthouse to Grace Darling and the Fastnet Yacht Disaster.

But some of the most interesting stories came from visitors themselves.

One local told me that, growing up, she knew the Low Lighthouse simply as ‘the umbrella’. When it started raining on the beach, children would run underneath it for shelter. She hadn’t really thought about the fact that it was a lighthouse. It just made up part of the landscape of her childhood.

Stories like this are exactly why the Travelling Pharology Archive exists. Lighthouse heritage is made up of people’s everyday relationships with these places.

Thank you to everyone who stopped for a conversation, shared a story or filled in a survey, and to the Harwich Society for welcoming the Archive to the museum!

The Archive picks up pieces of lighthouse heritage everywhere it goes.

Help the Archive keep travelling

The Travelling Pharology Archive is designed to grow as it travels. If you have a connection to a lighthouse, whether through work, family, your local area, a particular memory or simply a personal interest, I’d love to hear from you.

Contributions don’t have to be grand pieces of lighthouse history (and frankly, it’s more interesting if they aren’t!). Photographs, objects, memories and everyday stories can all help us understand what lighthouses mean to different people and communities. As the Archive develops, I want it to represent the many different ways people encounter and connect with lighthouse heritage.

I’m also looking for new places for the Archive to visit. If you represent a museum, heritage site, community group or other organisation and think the Travelling Pharology Archive could work in your space, please get in touch. The Archive is deliberately portable and adaptable, and each visit is an opportunity to explore the lighthouse stories connected to a new place.

To contribute to the Archive or discuss hosting a future visit, contact annie@lighthouseexplorers.com.