Signals Museum


Museum Exhibits

Not everything is World War Two!

It is true to say that the majority of the exhibits are from WW2, but there is much from other eras as well. The collection is shown as a timeline which starts with the Great War 1914-18. When the museum opened in 2000. nothing was shown from those early years, but there was a domestic Crystal Set from the 1920s. Over the years, a small collection of WW1 items has been introduced with further items from the ‘20s and ‘30s now also on display. Inevitably, the timeline leads to WW2 with the earliest items being developed from 1930s designs but as the War continued, much new development took place. Indeed, during that 6 year period, there was probably more new designs introduced than had happened in all the years since World War 1.

Post War Displays - Space is a problem

Most of the items on display come from WW2 and the pre-war period, the early days of radio. Because our building was built in 1917 as an office and store, it was not designed to hold a museum. In later years it became the Station Catholic Church and there are still signs of that occupancy. Space for post-war items is therefore a little limited. Most visitors are keen to see the early years equipments and learn how they were developed so a decision was made to limit the extent of the displays to about the early 1970s, with one or two exceptions. At that time, most equipments became black boxes, not quite so interesting to look at!

Photographs of the exhibits

In 2017, Colin Hinson took photographs of all the equipment in the museum. Note that we no longer have some of these items as they have been returned to their owners. All of Colin's photos are available here on his Radar website - to return to our museum site, use the link in the title at the top of each photo page.

A video tour of the museum by Dave Thompson


We have now been set a closure date by the authorities at RAF Henlow. This will be by the end of June 2024 but we will close for visitors after the May 2024 Open Day, and start to dispose of our exhibits.

Please go to the   Museum Closure page for more information.


If you have any comments, complaints, suggestions, requests etc, please drop me a line via my Genuki email page.

Page last updated 13th July 2023 by Colin Hinson.