User:PasschendaeleMuseum

Welcome to the user account of the Passchendaele Museum (Memorial Museum Passchendaele 1917).

Mission

The Memorial Museum Passchendaele 1917 is a military history museum telling the story of the First World War with a focus on Battle of Passchendaele through a thematic approach. As an experience museum, we want to create awareness about the life and techniques in the war. We want to provide a broad audience with knowledge about the landscape and the (im)moveable heritage as it serves as a witness to military strategies. Through well-developed regional and international activities, we want to keep alive the memories of the tragedy of the First World War and its aftermath.

Vision

The Third Battle of Ypres in 1917 is the pivotal event around which the Memorial Museum Passchendaele 1917 developed. The museum is located centrally in the former battlefield. The location and its surroundings still show the scars of that time. The museum is the gateway to this heritage. The MMP1917 also wants to be an open museum creating the link between historical facts and the landscape as a witness to military strategy. We offer the visitors information through objects and by creating an experience through a presentation of the events on the front lines at the Westhoek. The museum’s activities serve to provide further interpretation of the events of the war.

Remembrance and empathy require more than a simple museum presentation. The museum is thus at the centre of a network of heritage sites, to which it is linked physically and contextually. The most significant existing connection is between the museum and Tyne Cot Cemetery. In the visitors’ centre, we provide information focused on the cemetery and on the thousands of soldiers lying buried there. In the near future, we will also create a physical link between Polygon Wood and the MMP1917. The museum’s future activities are based on providing a good historical interpretation and opening up the heritage sites. The MMP1917 also aims to link this network to sites beyond the municipal borders. The museum wants to complement other First World War museums in the region.

The museum also stimulates the museum experience with targeted events in which memories and empathy are paramount. The museum uses living history to bring events back to life and enable the public to touch on the experiences as they happened at the time. These activities and historical interpretations provide the various heritage sites, within and outside the museum building, with an extra dimension. By profiling ourselves as an open museum, people can form a picture of the victims who fought and suffered in the surrounding landscape.