Based at the eastern end of Poole Quay, the town’s old lifeboat house is now open to the public as a museum. The main exhibit, on permanent loan from the National Maritime Museum Greenwich, is Poole’s former lifeboat, Thomas Kirk Wright.
Built in 1938, Thomas Kirk Wright was one of 18 lifeboats that took part in the Dunkirk evacuation of 1940. She was towed home, badly damaged, but restored to active service for the RNLI, helping to save many civilian lives.
Thomas Kirk Wright was kept in and launched from the old lifeboat house that is now the museum until she was decommissioned in 1962.
Run by volunteers, the museum raises much-needed funds for the Poole Branch of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI).
Find out more about Poole Old Lifeboat Museum on their website