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The Museum

The CFZ Museum, which already contains the CFZ archives, library, and zoological collection will eventually containing specially designed `environments` illustrating cryptid habitats around the world, and will be a resource for researchers from around the globe. It is this, and more as the Museum Outreach Projects become a reality. The museum itself which presently comprises an aviary block, a tropical room, and a large building in the CFZ Grounds, the refurbishing of which was kindly sponsored in part by Travis Perkins was completed in June 2008 after two years work. It is open to CFZ members and others on an appointment basis all year round, and to the general public on selected days each year.

In 2009 we received a very generous donation of exhibits from our old friend Lionel Beer, from the collection of his late father. These include the shell of an African softshelled turtle, and several othger stuffed and dried animals.

Just a few of the exhibits and animals from the CFZ Museum

One of the biggest projects for 2010 is going to be the rationalisation of the CFZ library and archive. Over the years we have collected an enormous amount of material; some of it directly relevant to our core subjects, and others less so. We already had a large library of books on esoteric subjects, and over the last few years we have inherited much more, including specialist libraries on African history, West Country dialects, the history of mapmaking, theology, and several other subjects. They became part of the CFZ library upon the death, or incapacitation, of their original owners. The library now stands at about 9000 books, and is growing. Add to that our voluminous case files, and large amounts of press cuttings, periodicals, and small press publications, and you have somewhat of a problem -a storage problem!

just in order to allow us some room to move, we have decided that at least half of our library; the half least relevant to our core concerns, will have to be put into storage. However, we want them to be available very quickly, so we have decided to embark on a mammoth cataloguing campaign, which - by the end of 2010 (if all goes well) - will mean that our entire library will be catalogued on computer, and therefore even the most obscure item in our collection will be accessible relatively quickly.

the construction of the museum was a long and arduous task