Burton Mail > News > A royal appointment if museum is saved? Print page Print page
A royal appointment if museum is saved? by HELEN KREFT PRINCESS Anne has given a massive boost to the Mail's campaign to save Burton's National Museum of Brewing from closure.
News - Save Our Heritage logo The Princess Royal said: "Keep the centre open and I'll pay a royal visit."
The Princess officially opened the Bass Museum on July 23, 1977, and has told The Mail she would welcome the chance to make another visit.
The pledge came after we contacted Buckingham Palace about the threatened closure of the museum and redistribution of many of the artefacts connected with Bass brewing as well as the award-winning Shire horses.
In response, a representative of Princess Anne acknowledged that the Queen's daughter did officially open the Bass Museum, saying she would be sad to see it close.
A spokesman for the Princess said: "While it is very sad, it is also not an unusual situation that a large number of organisations and institutions have closed during the 40 years that the Princess has been undertaking Royal duties.
"Every engagement that the Princess has attended, she has been very much involved in and is always sad to see something close.
"While the Princess Royal has no executive authority to comment on the closure of the Coors Visitor Centre, she would welcome an invitation to revisit the site should it be saved, like she has with many other cases."
HUNDREDS of beer buffs backed the campaign to save Burton's brewing museum at the weekend.
The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) held its national members' weekend for three days in Cardiff, and attracted around a thousand visitors.
They unanimously backed a motion put forward by Roger Protz, the editor of the Good Beer Guide and a fellow CAMRA member, urging Coors to extend its closing date of July to allow the attraction to be taken over by a charitable trust.
Members also signed The Mail's Save Our Heritage petition.
Mr Protz said: "There was not a single hand raised against the motion. There was a lot of passion felt about this particular issue.
"I said in my speech that there are around 90,000 CAMRA members, and I have urged them to flood Coors with letters not to close the visitor centre in June and to keep it open until Janet Dean and her working party can do something."
SIGN OUR ONLINE PETITION links to petition page here -