THE TREACLE miners of Sabden have become TV stars but the Earby lead miners are far less forthcoming.

In fact, unless you live in the town or have a passion for lead, the chances are you would never have heard of the Museum of Yorkshire Dales Lead Mining, an unusual attraction which is hoping to use a successful lottery bid to take it into the next century.

The museum, which grew out of an interest in mining among members of Earby Potholing Club, is housed in a 15th century building in School Lane which in the past has served as a school, a gentlemen's club, a library and finally a clinic before the Earby miners took it over in 1971 and opened the museum a year later.

It features a range of lead mining memorabilia and artefacts, many of them recovered from closed mines in the Yorkshire Dales by the potholers. They include everything from a piece of wire rope from Grassington Mines to a huge waterwheel-powered ore crusher.

Cabinets of miners' personal effect and tools sit alongside scale models of mining equipment and real-life examples of machinery.

The museum is a little known gem, buried in the streets of Earby, and run by a team of around 30 enthusiasts who admit it is not attracting as many visitors as they would like.

But all that could change if ambitious plans to expand the museum go ahead. The Earby Mining Research Group who run the museum are in the process of making it a charitable trust which will allow the organisation the chance to get funds from a wider range of sources.

At the moment unpaid volunteers run the museum and the research group pays a small rent, so fixed costs are kept to a minimum.

Grants from Earby Parish Council and Pendle Council also supplement the income, and a tea room, officially opened by parish council chairman Victor Marsh on Tuesda, is already making a small profit to boost the cash flow.

The volunteers are working hard to get donations and sponsorship to enable the museum to develop into a professional visitor attraction and educational centre.

Part of the first major reorganisation of the museum in its 25-year-history are preparations to put in a bid for lottery cash to help pay for an extension to the listed building.

Plans are in their early stages and the museum group have not yet set a figure on how much the bid will be.

"We've had a specialist architect working on the plans and we're confident we will be successful," said Peter Hart. "We want to create a lecture area so that we have room to tell people and school parties a bit of the history of lead mining and the museum before they go into it.

"We also want to install toilets and a lift for disabled people so the building is opened up to everyone.

"We have to be a trust before we can apply for the lottery money but we're hoping by the end of the year we will be in a position to apply."

He added: "There are a lot of things we would like to do and a lot we've already done. We've achieved quite a lot in the past 25 years. We've put together a unique collection. There's nothing like this anywhere else in the country."

David Carlisle, secretary of the research group and the only member with a mining background, said the aim was to try to open the museum up to more people rather than just mining enthusiasts.

He admitted: "We've never had the professional advice or the money to make the most of the exhibits but things are changing.

"We're hoping by the year 2000 we'll have one of the best industrial museums of its kind," he said. "It will be run in a much more professional way and be of more interest to the public instead of mainly mining enthusiasts."

The museum is open Wednesday to Sunday 1pm to 5pm, except Thursday when it opens until 8pm. There is a small admission charge. For more details contact 01282 815686.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.