Strikes ….memories ….. and Miss Dannimac ….. more from the Manchester Jewish Museum

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single visit to a museum is never enough and must be followed by a second, third and fourth.

Window, 2026

Now, this is particularly true of the Manchester Jewish Museum which celebrates and records the history and culture of the Jewish community here and abroad.*

The Museum, 2025

I first discovered the museum soon after it opened in 1984 and followed that first visit with becoming a “Friend”, and have written extensively about it.**

But as so often happens other things get in the way, and I hadn’t been back for a very long time.

So, with a morning free I took the tram to Victoria and wandered up Cheetham Hill Road and was not disappointed.

I guess I was there for a couple of hours, learned a lot from the displays and enjoyed a series of conversations with some of the guides.

Of all the fascinating exhibits the one that drew me back was a page from The Waterproofer which was the official newspaper of the Waterproof Garment Worker’s Trade Union for July 1935 which recorded the end of 1934-5 strike.

The strike which was a response to the lowering piecework rates lasted nine months with the newspaper recording that the union would “not rest until every unscrupulous employer is dealt with and sweating abolished in the trade”. 

The Waterproofer, 1935

It is a story I was not over familiar with but it’s one I intend to follow up, and in that I may be helped by the memory maps of Jewish Manchester which are “a new digital resource where you can explore former sites of Jewish memory in the Cheetham Hill, Strangeways and Hightown areas of Manchester. Here you will find audio interviews, photographs, and information about more than 40 sites (we hope to include more in future) that consistently appear in people's recollections of these areas”.***

And then there is Miss Dannimac the “canvas Rain Coat … You’ve got to like Fashion to wear it”.  

Miss Dannimac. 2026

It was created by Ralph Levy who had “a vision of making rainwear not just practical but fashionable [and] new manufacturing techniques allowed Ralph to produce coats in lighter fabrics which were featured in Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar and modelled by fashion icons including Twiggy”.

And that I think is all for now, because while there is a great deal more in the museum, I think that should be for a visit.

Pictures; Thursday at the museum, 2026 & 2025 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Manchester Jewish Museum, https://www.manchesterjewishmuseum.com/

**Manchester Jewish Museum, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20Manchester%20Jewish%20Museum

***Waterproof Garment Workers Trade Union, A Memory Map of Jewish Manchester, https://jewishmanchestermemorymap.org/?feature_type=point&id=320

Mornings at Manchester Jewish Museum …..

The Manchester Jewish Museum* is one of my favourite places and has been since it opened in 1984 and is a place I regularly write about.**

Almost soon after that opening I signed up to be a “Friend” and while the scheme has changed its name, I remain happy to support its work which as it says is “a registered charity (charity no. 1154353) and accredited museum (no. 179). 

We connect Jewish stories to the world and to our society, in order to explore both our differences and similarities, and to celebrate that which makes people unique and that which connects us all.

As well as preserving and presenting the history of Jewish Manchester, our programme helps us bring communities together to understand and share experiences. 

Delivering meaningful and sustainable engagement projects with our diverse communities. [which it does through] “schools activities educating future generations about Jewish history and traditions”.

All of which is done in the “Grade II* Listed Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, which holds a fascinating collection documenting Manchester’s rich and diverse Jewish heritage.

And that is how I first came across the Museum in the 1980s when I was researching and delivering history courses on Jewish Manchester to school students.

Back then the museum was very helpful in lending material I could use.

More recently following a £6 million redevelopment the museum now has a new purpose built gallery to display our collection, which is presented  in three themes, Journeys, Communities and Identities.

All the stories told on gallery are Jewish but by framing them within these universal themes they hopefully feel relevant to all of our audiences, Jewish and non-Jewish.

Our Journeys Gallery tells the story of the different motivations that brought Jewish people to Manchester: looking for opportunity, escaping hardship, poverty or persecution, and ‘landsleit’ – the move to join existing communities that reflect your own identity. 

From 18th Century pedlars to 20th Century refugees and Holocaust Survivors, the collection reflects each wave of Jewish migration into Manchester.

Our Journeys Gallery also includes a newly commissioned 4-screen immersive film produced by Heritage Interactive and directed by Dan Lusby. Heritage Interactive produced all the digital creative content in our gallery including this film, our sliding digital panels on our organisations wall, and the Jewish identity tablets in our Identities Gallery”. 

The museum hosts a whole variety of events from cultural to comic, along special exhibitions and has an interesting policy towards those who live in the area which encourages local residents to become “one of our Museum M8s and get free admission to the museum all year round for you and your family”.

I took a trip up from Chorlton last week and was not disappointed.

Location; Manchester Jewish Museum, Cheetham Hill Road

Pictures; Thursday at the museum, 2026 & 2025 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Manchester Jewish Museum, https://www.manchesterjewishmuseum.com/

**Manchester Jewish Museum, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20Manchester%20Jewish%20Museum