Veenkoloniaal Museum

Veenkoloniaal Museum (English: Peat-colonial Museum) is a regional museum in the village of Veendam in the Netherlands. The museum shows not only the history of the peat district in Groningen. Situated in a monumental building dating from 1911 the Veenkoloniaal Museum exhibits the development of the Groninger Peat district but also the history of hundreds of inland barges and a similar number of skippers families. For the Groningen peatdistrict the 19th century is a golden age. Agriculture, shipping and potato starch and strawboard industries flourish. Hundreds of captains sail from Veendam, Wildervank, Oude Pekela, Nieuwe Pekela to Portugal, Great Britain and the Baltic Sea. Strawboard is exported to England, which explains the name Albion of one of the factories. Amazing when you consider that these enterprising villages are situated more than forty kilometres from the coast. In 2008–2019, the museum had between 20,000 and 29,000 visitors annually.

Location
The Veenkoloniaal Museum is located at the Museumplein 5 in the village of Veendam in the province of Groningen in the northeast of the Netherlands.

History
The museum was founded on 15 December 1939.

Since 1989, the museum is housed in a former school building in the center of Veendam.

Administration
Hendrik Andries Hachmer is director of the museum.

In the years 2003 to 2019, the museum had between 17,500 and 28,600 visitors per year, with more than 25,000 visitors in 2016.

The museum is a member of the regional Museumhuis Groningen (Groningen Museum House) and the national Museumvereniging (Museum Association).