We had one last stop to make in Southport before heading to Liverpool for the evening. I learned about the British Lawnmower Museum while watching The Open Championship last summer. David Feherty did a segment on the museum, and curator Brian Ragan was excited to have a group of professional course managers over for a visit.

Curator Brian Ragan has been collecting lawnmowers since he was nine years old. Before going to the museum itself he invited us to their warehouse to see some older models and units that were still being restored.

Group photo with Brian Ragan inside the warehouse for the museum. The warehouse tour was especially for us and not typically included in the museum tour.

Brian Ragan shows off the many mower baskets in the warehouse

Brian Moore compares the weight of this machine to modern equipment.

Alan FitzGerald takes one for a spin...

The Museum has over 300 restored exhibits of garden items dating back over 200 years. They also have the original patent for Edward Buddings original mower under lock and key. Brians goal with the museum is to document the engineering from the many companies (most long shuttered) who created gardening equipment over the years. He also has a number of mowers owned by celebrities on display.

Restored mowers in the museum proper.

In addition to tours of the warehouse and museum, TurfNet members watched an instructional video from the 1950s and received a signed copy of Brians book Haynes Lawnmower manual: A practical guide to choosing, using and maintaining a lawnmower.

In a follow up email, Brian had this to say about our stop at the museum: "Hi Jon, Thank you & the great group of guys for visiting the Museum. Hope everyone had a unique experience, perhaps something to remember forever-mower!"