The museum site occupies the former Netherpool port that was designed by Thomas Telford, under the direction of William Jessop, for the ill-fated Ellesmere Canal. The proposed waterway in England and Wales was planned to carry commercial traffic between the riversMersey and Severn. The museum's historic buildings are all that remain of the inland port that transferred goods and cargo from narrowboats onto rivercraft that would then sail to the docks at Liverpool. The northern section of the Ellesmere Canal, which was built as a contour canal, connected Netherpool port to Chester Canal in 1797. When it opened, its revenue was expected to help fund the rest of the Ellesmere Canal project. However by 1805 work had stalled because of rising costs and the failure to generate the expected income from commercial boat traffic. The plans to build the remaining southern section to the Shrewsbury Canal and the connection between Pontcysyllte and Chester were abandoned. For the next forty years the port served boats using the Chester Canal until it was taken over by the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company in 1845. It amalgamated the former stretches of Ellesmere Canal, along with Eastern and Western branches of the Montgomery Canal, the Shrewsbury Canal and the Shropshire Canal into the Shropshire Union Canal. The port at Netherpool remained in operation until it was finally closed in the 1950s.
Waterways museum
A museum, which was called the North West Museum of Inland Navigation, was founded at the disused port in the 1970s. It was later renamed The Boat Museum and then, until 2012, the National Waterways Museum at Ellesmere Port. In the 1990s The Waterways Trust took on the management of the National Waterways Museum. Funding from Heritage Lottery Fund helped create new displays and improve visitor facilities. In 2012, the Waterways Trust was incorporated to the Canal & River Trust. The name National Waterways Museum was formerly used to include the inland waterways collection at two other museum sites in England, which now are named the Gloucester Waterways Museum in Gloucester, and The Canal Museum in Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire.
Funding
The museum is entrusted with a collection that has the status of a designated collection, as determined by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. However, the standard of collection management has been the subject of considerable concern and criticism in the waterways press because, essentially, the museum has insufficient money to fund the upkeep of the many historic boats in the collection. Unlike the National Railway Museum, which receives funding direct from HM Government, the NWM only receives public money through the Canal and River Trust, previously British Waterways. During the winter of 2008–2009, opening hours were cut at Gloucester and Ellesmere Port to just two days per week in an effort to manage a tough financial situation. Some boats were advertised in Museums Journal early in 2009 for disposal, there being insufficient money for their restoration. Visitors to the Ellesmere Port site can see boats, in the care of a National Museum, sunken into the water or kept afloat by automatic pumps. However, the initiative to create a Heritage Boatyard, with lottery and other funding, has spurred a revival in the museum's fortunes and work on addressing the areas of maintenance is now taking place. The Heritage Boatyard trains young people in skills that might otherwise be lost. Two boats, Ilkeston and Ferret, are sponsored by the London Canal Museum, which contributes annually to the cost of their maintenance.
Collections
The museum incorporates all surviving parts of the original industrial port. Over the past 40 years, the historic site has been restored. This includes the locks, docks and warehouses and a pump and engine room. A toll house built in 1805 and the Island Warehouse was built in 1871 to store grain. The Island Warehouse has an exhibition on the history of boat-building and another describing the social history of canals. The Pump House contains the steam-driven pumping engines which supplied power for the hydrauliccranes and the capstans which were used around the dock, and the Power Hall contains a variety of other engines. The blacksmith's forge was where the ironwork for the canal and its boats was made. A resident blacksmith works in the forge. The stables which housed the horses and pigs are still present. The former toll house hosts temporary and touring exhibitions. The Waterways Archive contains a wide range of material relating to waterways in Britain and abroad. A terrace of four houses known as Porter's Row contains dock workers' cottages which have been decorated and furnished to represent different periods from the 1840s to the 1950s. The museum contains a collection of historic boats. Short boat trips along the Shropshire Union Canal are arranged. The museum is open at advertised times throughout the year. The locks within the museum site are designated by English Heritage as Grade II listed buildings. Also listed at Grade II are the lighthouse at the entry of the canal into the Mersey, and a lock keeper's hut.
Television
In 2010, the museum was one of three featured on Richard Macer's BBC Four series Behind the Scenes at the Museum.
