THE company behind Bury town centre’s multi-million pound retail development has handed over the first instalment of its £150,000 donation toward the completion of the new Fusilier Museum.

The money, a welcome £50,000, will go towards moving the museum at Wellington Barracks to its new location at the Arts and Crafts Centre in Broad Street, Bury. The facility is due to open on Gallipoli Day, April 25, 2009.

Andrew Sanderson, director of Thornfield Properties, presented a cheque for £50,000 to museum curator Lieutenant Colonel Mike Glover of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers (Lancashire).

Last year the Fusiliers’ Development Project nearly ground to a halt as the Museum Steering Group struggled to reach its financial target, but following a deal agreed between Bury Council’s chief executive, Mark Sanders, and Thornfield’s chairman, Jason Marcus, the pledge of £150,000 helped put the project back on track.

The donation from Thornfield contributes to the £1.8 million the Museum Steering Group needed to match the £2 million pledged by the Heritage Lottery Fund to cover the costs of the Fusilier Museum. This involves the complete refurbishment of the Arts and Crafts Centre, to house a complete redisplay of the Fusiliers’ museum collection, showing it in a more informative and modern way.

Thornfield’s first instalment comes as work continues on The Rock to create a mixed use town centre regeneration project. The scheme will deliver a mix of shops, leisure and residential facilities for Bury town, including a new Marks and Spencer and Debenhams stores, a Vue cinema with ten screens, an AMF bowling alley, a Pizza Express and eight further restaurants, along with 408 new apartments and a 1,250 multi-storey car park for the town, opening in 2010, and a new Primary Care Centre with GP’s surgery, chiropodist and dentist, opening in October this year.

Mr Sanderson said the donation was to show the company’s commitment towards the museum and Bury. He added: “Another cultural asset in Bury can only be good news for everyone who has an interest in the town. We want to see both culture and commerce flourish.”

Bury Council’s chief executive, Mark Sanders, said: “Both the Fusilier Museum and The Rock are important opportunities for delivering the council’s commitment to making Bury a better place to live and work. It is appropriate that the commercial opportunity should support the charitable one.”

Colonel of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, Brigadier Trevor Minter, described the efforts of those involved in raising funds for the museum as “as brave and ambitious as any military campaign”.

He also praised the support received from the authorities and people of the North West and Bury, in particular. “The town has always made Fusiliers welcome and our relationship is once again cemented for generations to come, as it was after Gallipoli. It is wonderful to know that wherever Fusiliers serve in the future, they will know that their history will be preserved, celebrated and remembered in this special museum.”

Accepting the cheque on behalf of the Fusilier Museum, Lieutenant Colonel Mike Glover said: “We are profoundly grateful to Thornfield for this donation. It has made a huge difference to our fundraising campaign and we hope it will open the way for future commercial support for our museum which is a valuable asset to the town of Bury.”