Cromer is a two-faced place. In summer it's cheery enough, with its pier, promenade and the carefully tended bedding plants on the way to the golf course, but in winter there can be no greyer, more desolate hell-hole this side of Murmansk.
Like all seaside towns, it's seen better days - specifically the 1890s, when its railway links to London and the Midlands created a tourist klondike on the North Sea. The masses and their betters flocked to Poppyland, as it was branded by the Great Eastern Railway.
Meanwhile, another Cromer, a harsh place of foul weather, stinking fish and deadly sandbanks was evident in the form of picturesque open fishing boats lined up in front of the lifeboat station. Each of these versions is displayed in the town, respectively at Cromer Museum and the Henry Blogg Museum. They don't overlap much, which illustrates just what a bizarre industry tourism is, with its knowing creation of a fantasy of intact rural bliss, otherwise experienced as poverty and deprivation.
Cromer Museum is the summer version, and £500,000 has been spent on acomprehensive refurbishment that includes a new geology gallery, front entrance, shop and education room and improved access for disabled visitors. It is snuggled under the massive perpendicular church, where a row of fishermen's cottages was converted into a local history museum in 1978.
The new foyer is light, volunteer staff are friendly and the shop is appealing. The geology gallery is tucked into a lean-to opposite the cottages and the nautical theme design has helped to maximise the tight space, which consists of tidy showcases with drawers below, and excellent graphic panels. The text is engaging and effective. 'Most of the objects in this gallery have been found by keen-eyed beachcombers. The next fossil discovery could be yours… after you visit why not go to the beach - who knows what you will find.' That's exactly what we did, and guess what, we came home with a trilobite tail.
Britain's oldest and most complete elephant fossil - the West Runton elephant - is one of the greatest recent nearby finds. Most of the fossil, however, is now in the Castle Museum in Norwich, which sits with Cromer Museum under the Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service umbrella.
Moving into the body of the museum, the story of the tourist trade is cheerfully told, although beneath the jolly posters lurks a slyly inserted postcard from Poppyland 1911: 'I thought you might like a poppy, which you are supposed to see at Cromer.
The ground is rather barren and we have not seen any heathers.' Family holidays, don't you just love em! Cromer has a self-deprecating sense of humour - if you were going to quote Winston Churchill on the charms of your delightful resort, would you choose this testimonial, recently etched into the new promenade? 'I am not enjoying myself very much.'
The recreated fisherman's cottage element of the museum, embroidered slippers included, is a bit twee for my taste. 'Despite great age and years of hard wear the quality of these labours of love shines through,' is the caption for the Sheringham Gansey (woollen sweater) pinned to the wall.
Down the road at the appropriately ship-shape Henry Blogg Museum, there's true grit to be had. The museum was built in partnership by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) and North Norfolk District Council at a cost of £1.8m. It was designed by the same architect who worked on the Cromer Museum redevelopment - Purcell Miller Tritton.
Born and bred in Cromer, Henry Blogg was an archetypal hero, a big man of few pretensions and even fewer words who retired as Coxswain in 1947 aged 71. In his one and only public speech, he said everything about himself that mattered - 'Cromer always has had good boats and good crews. And it always will.'
During his 53 years service, the Cromer boats were out 387 times and saved an astonishing 873 lives. Blogg earned his first of a record three RNLI gold medals for the Fernebo rescue, a steamer that had been broken in two by an explosion just off the coast of Cromer in January 1917. Despite having already carried out one launch that day, and watched by a huge crowd on the beach, Blogg and his crew (whose average age was over 50 because of the call-up for the first world war), battled through a gale powered only by oars to reach the stricken wreck.
Blogg was brilliantly photographed throughout his career by local and national press in images that convey his quietly tragic private life - his infant son and his only daughter both died before he did - as well as his weathered, far-eyed masculinity.
His face and those of his crew, gathered in the lifeboat station or launching for a rescue along the treacherous Norfolk coast with its shifting sands and viciously unpredictable seas, are powerfully evocative of courage in the face of danger.
The central aisle of the museum is filled with the lifeboat HF Bailey, which served under Blogg in the second world war. There are some unexceptional interactives and information about the RNLI today so that hyper children and their exhausted parents can find something to amuse themselves as they cool off from the beach with the prospect of a decent lunch in the upstairs cafe.
The museum does its eponymous hero proud. Henry Blogg connects the two Cromers - as a summer sideline he rented out deckchairs on the beach to tourists, who were impressed by his celebrity status. These days, Cromer's historic purposes are over - fishing, agriculture, royalty, seaside resorts, even geography, they're all on the slide around here.
But hefty regeneration funding has given a new sheen to the town and its museums. They both tell their stories efficiently and enjoyably, though for me it's the lifeboat museum that comes out on top, because I prefer Blogg to Poppyland, Cromer dark to Cromer lite.
Laura Drysdale is a writer and consultant
Like all seaside towns, it's seen better days - specifically the 1890s, when its railway links to London and the Midlands created a tourist klondike on the North Sea. The masses and their betters flocked to Poppyland, as it was branded by the Great Eastern Railway.
Meanwhile, another Cromer, a harsh place of foul weather, stinking fish and deadly sandbanks was evident in the form of picturesque open fishing boats lined up in front of the lifeboat station. Each of these versions is displayed in the town, respectively at Cromer Museum and the Henry Blogg Museum. They don't overlap much, which illustrates just what a bizarre industry tourism is, with its knowing creation of a fantasy of intact rural bliss, otherwise experienced as poverty and deprivation.
Cromer Museum is the summer version, and £500,000 has been spent on acomprehensive refurbishment that includes a new geology gallery, front entrance, shop and education room and improved access for disabled visitors. It is snuggled under the massive perpendicular church, where a row of fishermen's cottages was converted into a local history museum in 1978.
The new foyer is light, volunteer staff are friendly and the shop is appealing. The geology gallery is tucked into a lean-to opposite the cottages and the nautical theme design has helped to maximise the tight space, which consists of tidy showcases with drawers below, and excellent graphic panels. The text is engaging and effective. 'Most of the objects in this gallery have been found by keen-eyed beachcombers. The next fossil discovery could be yours… after you visit why not go to the beach - who knows what you will find.' That's exactly what we did, and guess what, we came home with a trilobite tail.
Britain's oldest and most complete elephant fossil - the West Runton elephant - is one of the greatest recent nearby finds. Most of the fossil, however, is now in the Castle Museum in Norwich, which sits with Cromer Museum under the Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service umbrella.
Moving into the body of the museum, the story of the tourist trade is cheerfully told, although beneath the jolly posters lurks a slyly inserted postcard from Poppyland 1911: 'I thought you might like a poppy, which you are supposed to see at Cromer.
The ground is rather barren and we have not seen any heathers.' Family holidays, don't you just love em! Cromer has a self-deprecating sense of humour - if you were going to quote Winston Churchill on the charms of your delightful resort, would you choose this testimonial, recently etched into the new promenade? 'I am not enjoying myself very much.'
The recreated fisherman's cottage element of the museum, embroidered slippers included, is a bit twee for my taste. 'Despite great age and years of hard wear the quality of these labours of love shines through,' is the caption for the Sheringham Gansey (woollen sweater) pinned to the wall.
Down the road at the appropriately ship-shape Henry Blogg Museum, there's true grit to be had. The museum was built in partnership by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) and North Norfolk District Council at a cost of £1.8m. It was designed by the same architect who worked on the Cromer Museum redevelopment - Purcell Miller Tritton.
Born and bred in Cromer, Henry Blogg was an archetypal hero, a big man of few pretensions and even fewer words who retired as Coxswain in 1947 aged 71. In his one and only public speech, he said everything about himself that mattered - 'Cromer always has had good boats and good crews. And it always will.'
During his 53 years service, the Cromer boats were out 387 times and saved an astonishing 873 lives. Blogg earned his first of a record three RNLI gold medals for the Fernebo rescue, a steamer that had been broken in two by an explosion just off the coast of Cromer in January 1917. Despite having already carried out one launch that day, and watched by a huge crowd on the beach, Blogg and his crew (whose average age was over 50 because of the call-up for the first world war), battled through a gale powered only by oars to reach the stricken wreck.
Blogg was brilliantly photographed throughout his career by local and national press in images that convey his quietly tragic private life - his infant son and his only daughter both died before he did - as well as his weathered, far-eyed masculinity.
His face and those of his crew, gathered in the lifeboat station or launching for a rescue along the treacherous Norfolk coast with its shifting sands and viciously unpredictable seas, are powerfully evocative of courage in the face of danger.
The central aisle of the museum is filled with the lifeboat HF Bailey, which served under Blogg in the second world war. There are some unexceptional interactives and information about the RNLI today so that hyper children and their exhausted parents can find something to amuse themselves as they cool off from the beach with the prospect of a decent lunch in the upstairs cafe.
The museum does its eponymous hero proud. Henry Blogg connects the two Cromers - as a summer sideline he rented out deckchairs on the beach to tourists, who were impressed by his celebrity status. These days, Cromer's historic purposes are over - fishing, agriculture, royalty, seaside resorts, even geography, they're all on the slide around here.
But hefty regeneration funding has given a new sheen to the town and its museums. They both tell their stories efficiently and enjoyably, though for me it's the lifeboat museum that comes out on top, because I prefer Blogg to Poppyland, Cromer dark to Cromer lite.
Laura Drysdale is a writer and consultant
