West Ham Museum

To the board of directors at West Ham United,

Hammers United is writing to you today regarding the as yet unfulfilled promise of a Club Museum. As a Club and fanbase which has tremendous pride in its history and working-class roots, we are concerned that our Club’s history is not being fully represented by the Club in a way that allows people to connect with it in an appropriate setting. To this end, we would like to work with the Club to find a place for all West Ham fans to celebrate and engage with the Club’s rich history.

The West Ham Museum at the Boleyn Ground provided a space where supporters could engage with the Club’s history professionally. It was clear that much time and effort had been put into creating this space and those who did attend the museum found it to be a very enjoyable experience.

Whilst the previous administration closed the museum in the late 2000s, the regular mention of a new Club Museum in the Club’s original proposal for the London Stadium during the first tender process appeared to show that opening a new museum was a matter of importance to the Club and was something that supporters were happy to see. However, following the collapse of the first tender process in October 2011, there was no further mention of a new Club Museum.

In light of this, we are curious as to why the museum received no mention at all in the second tender process. We are also curious as to why no further mention of the museum was made by the Club until an Official Supporters Board (OSB) meeting in October 2019. In the minutes of this meeting, which were published on the Club’s website, the Club’s vice-chair stated that “the Club would welcome a proper museum which is part of the stadium tour”. While this news was well received by supporters there at the time, there has, thus far, been no further development on this front.

As you have no doubt seen yourselves, there is an appetite for a permanent museum to be located at the stadium, as shown by the success of the pop-up exhibit in the Club’s shop to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the 1980 FA Cup win.

We respect that any plans to establish a permanent museum at the stadium might have been delayed by the covid pandemic or due to any issues surrounding insurance premiums of having certain items out on display. We also understand that a museum might be difficult to establish at the stadium due to the fact that we do not currently own it. Nevertheless, we believe the Club should pursue all avenues towards achieving a permanent museum.

In the meantime, we would like to explore some alternative options to find a way for West Ham supporters to have a space to engage with the Club’s history.

Perhaps a temporary pop-up exhibit could be a viable way of presenting the Club’s rich history and heritage. Such Pop-up exhibits have proven to be successful for other Clubs.

With plenty of office space available around Stratford following the Covid-19 pandemic, perhaps the Club could hire space to highlight the Club’s history to the community on a more permanent basis. Any exhibit in which the Club is showing itself to be engaging with the local community reflects well on everybody.

Hammers United would be more than willing to help in this matter, by giving its full support to the Club and also seeking support from The Supporters Club, other fan groups and fans forums in sharing this idea with their members, while at the same time encouraging historians of the Club to share their memorabilia as part of the exhibit.

Continuing with this idea of engaging with the community, another proposal we’d like to discuss is the possibility of working with the West Ham United Foundation and other charitable parts of the Club to take certain historic items out to events or into schools as part of the foundation’s education programmes.

This practice has proven popular for the national football museum, which regularly takes low-insurance items (boots, balls, etc.) to external talks that employees of the museum & their archives give to local schools and at events in Greater Manchester & Lancashire, allowing people to engage with these items.

With over 1000 items of memorabilia in its possession, we believe there is a huge opportunity for the Club to release certain items to its employees to take with them on their visits and allow people to engage with them.

We hope that if this idea works out well, especially in educational settings, it could provide the initiative for the Club to establish a more permanent museum at the stadium. This would allow schools and other educational establishments to come and engage with the Club and its history. It also provides the Club with a means to make good on its promise to make the London Stadium a place for the community.

West Ham United is a football Club that relies heavily on its heritage to tell its story. We all use heritage to connect with the Club. In the case of supporters, we use our heritage to discuss how we came to support the Club, be it through our families or a connection to a certain squad from the past. In the case of the Club, it has been used in multiple ways, including the design of the Club’s current badge, which honours the Thames Ironworks, the company that started our beloved Club.

It is our history and heritage which makes West Ham United so important. It is what we are. It is who we are. It is the story of West Ham United. This is why we must all continue to pursue the creation of a West Ham United Museum.

We hope that you share our passion and desire to see West Ham United’s rich heritage displayed for our current fans to enjoy and hopefully inspire future generations of West Ham supporters too.

If you are willing to discuss this with us, we will make ourselves available at any time and hopefully together, we can give supporters a place to celebrate our history.

Yours sincerely,
The Hammers United Committee.