Transport Museum To Open Soon

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31865, 18 December 1968, Page 27

Transport Museum To Open Soon

Vintage cars, motorcycles and horse-drawn vehicles will be on display at a Christchurch man’s transport museum at Yaldhurst on Boxing Day.

Mr A. T. Cooper has a deep interest in the preservation of old vehicles, which he has been collecting from all over the South Island for many years. Boxing Day will be the first occasion on which he has shown any of them to the public.

In the last two months both paid and voluntary helpers have erected two large buildings on Mr Cooper’s property in School Road. Yaldhurst. so the vehicles can be shown. There is now about 2500 sq. ft of covered display area, and as well as the vehicles there will be numerous displays of vintage engines, radiators, motoring accessories, and trappings for horse-drawn vehicles. Field Events Vintage car and motor-cycle enthusiasts are to lend Mr Cooper several vehicles to add to his display, and on Boxing Day members of the Vintage Car Club will take both vintage cars and motorcycles to the School Road property as well. Many of these vehicles will take part in field events.

Beside the display area is a large field, and this will be used for parking and for the field events. The oldest vehicle in the display is expected to be a 1900 Northern car lent by a member of the Vintage Car Club. In the main display | area there will be about 30 horse-drawn vehicles, six vin-1 tage cars belonging to Mr! Cooper and several others* lent for the occasion, and about 25 vintage motor-cycles. ■ A major attraction is expected to be a huge 1924 Ley- I land six-cylinder fire engine? which was originally used ini Dunedin. There will also be some j vintage cycles on display. More Space Needed The museum area will remain open until the New I Year, but Mr Cooper hopes! this will be merely the small! beginning of a substantial! museum. Not all the vehicles! on display have yet been fully; restored, and in addition to I

these Mr Cooper has dozens of other vintage vehicles on which restoration work has not yet been started. After New Year, the museum will be closed for about two months so more facili-

ties can be provided. It is hoped the official opening of the museum will be held at Easter. He planned to put income from the museum’s first displays back into the restoration of more vehitles and the provision of more facilities, Mr Cooper said yesterday. More display buildings were badly needed, and plans for them were now being drawn up. Mr Cooper, who is at present an insurance broker, expects that the museum will eventually become a full-time occupation. “In a few years,” he says, “we will probably look back with surprise at these small beginnings,” Meanwhile, Mr Cooper’s search for vintage vehicles continues. Until now, he says, his main concern has been to collect vehicles and parts and store them under cover before they are lost for ever.