That 'basement' transport museum was great. It could best be entered by the disabled access to the museum at ground level which was alongside all those steps. ( so just like you enter it now without walking up them) When you entered the museum, you were in a dark foyer. If you did an immediate sharp left, that was the staircase up to the other floors, to your left at 9 o'clock were the toilets and straight ahead of you on the left was the dark corridor aquarium (at the other end of that corridor were the spiders and snakes in glass cases then the other stairs up) Back top the entrance foyer and the transport museum was to your right, up about 2 or 3 steps.
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When you first entered it, the John Masons removal wagon was on your right, the Anglia was around the corner on the left. Facing it was the fire engine with its ladder on a wheel. There were bone shakers/penny farthings on the wall and railway carriages with dummies in and sometimes a film show would be on in one of them. The Lion locomotive was also on view in the far right corner. This has been in the Bootle's stores for years and will soon be in the new museum having been restored and was in the film Thunderbolt.
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