I forgot to mention that the museum (full name Great North Museum:Hancock) stands on the Great North Road. The plaque is on the Hancock house opposite the museum at 20 Great North Road.

The ‘Great North’ tourism formulation has been around for years and is meant to distinguish the region – hence the Great North Run etc. It isn’t just bragging over the word ‘great’. The new museum contains artefacts from several museums unconnected with the Hancocks, so a new name was perhaps appropriate.

I loved the Hancock of my youth, the glass cases and racks of wooden drawers full of amazing butterflies. Its later appearance seemed dingy and understocked to me. I always felt sorry for that lonely piranha.

I should remark that dinosaur bones are very rare and all the T-Rex ones you see in the museums of the world are made of plaster, including the Natural History Museum specimen in London. And everyone wants to see T-Rex.

Getting all those smaller museums into one place is an excellent idea anyway.

The museum I visited in my youth decades ago suited me well. I loved the objects in cases and the butterflies – wonderful. The later

I visited the Hancock

Many other aspects of the museum were poor. Did no-one feel the geology displays were slapdash? The piles of contextless gems and stones reminded me more of tynemouth market than of an educational display in a “Great” museum.

There were other off putting examples of how this supposedly modern (and don’t be fooled into think that modern is better) style museum is jarring and poorly thought out.

For example, was it not a strange experience for everyone else to be reading about the wildlife of northumberland, whilst at the same time having the back-end of a samurai in front of you?

What about birds with no labels to identifty them with?

The overly bright lighting which meant you couldn’t see into a lot of the cases at all?

The open nature of the museum which led to two teeth being taken from the t-rex model already?

Also the Roman alters crammed into one corner with little explanation and no thought of holding up each piece individually?

I’m still struggling to figure out how they could extend a building, yet still make it feel significantly smaller than before the refit.

It would be a good place to go as a 10 year old, but 10 year olds would learn just as much about natural history by riding one of the those whale-shaped wooden rockers (with springs underneath) at a park.

And I think it is a great part of the cultural heritage of Newcastle/Gateshead but I would argue that it was this back in the Hancock days also: I don’t see that as something new.

It is also sad that you don’t feel it provides a much enhanced addition to the cultural heritage of Newcastle and Gateshead.

and so we will have to disagree.

However, there’s a risk in getting bogged down with the name; I’d presume we’re both in agreement that the content is more important.

The reference to the mangy looking lion was simply a suggestion that if they were going to remove some of the older things from the display, there were things that I think should have been removed ahead of some of the things which were…

There are indeed a lot of things I liked about the museum (the Roman display in particular; also the ‘trip back in time’ section) – I just think that it could have been better still (non-working ‘interactive’ displays are a complete waste of space after all). And they have a section where they include some of the museum collections and the history of the museum – this is good, but would have also provided an ideal space for some of the other displays that don’t quite fit the ‘modern’ view.

I’m not against change or modernisation: it’s just that I have a deep personal affection for the Hancock/GNM and want it to be right. I think if it hadn’t been closed for so long, I probably wouldn’t have expected so much, but in three years, I do think it could have been done better.

The Hancock brothers didn’t set out to do something comfortable and unchallenging – they were scientists and pioneers and modern. The museum attempts to uphold that principle. Its not scared of new.

I agree – only time will tell if the initial interest is sustained but the initial response and visitor numbers would not have been achieved if they kept the old name and some of the outdated displays. Also, I don’t suppose visitors wanted to go back and see what was there before (although you clearly do).

And when does a moth eaten Lion loose its character and become not fit for display.