The fascinating artefacts amassed by the late Jack Cardall now reside in the town's old labour exchange in Warwick Road.

It had been feared that the horde, which includes a Home Guard practice rifle and fire brigade hunting horn, would have to be dispersed after Jack's wife Renee died in 2007.

But thanks to the benevolence of Major Terrence and Sheila Mills, who own the premises, the collection has been relocated from Renee's Beech Loft home.

The official opening of the building, which has been secured by The Friends of the Cardall Collection on a two to five year lease, will take place on April 25.

Volunteer Bernard Cadogan said: "After 18 months of uncertainty, some very generous contributions from a number of companies, private individuals and £2,000 from Southam Town Council, and an awful lot of hard work on the part of some volunteers, we have finally moved into our new home.

"There has been a lot of interest about what is going on in the building from passers by and people will now be able to come in and see what we have done.

"We will be setting up some exhibitions on the day and visitors will be able to watch a computer slide show and hear recordings from our oral history project of residents' memories of the town."

The volunteers have so far catalogued more than 1,500 of the objects and held workshops and exhibitions, including a 'What Makes a Museum' display in the library which attracted 180 schoolchildren.

But there is still more work to do and the volunteers hope to hold regular exhibitions in schools and other locations in the town.

Mr Cadogan said: "This collection is really important to Southam. It covers its history and if we hadn't found a home it would have been lost forever.

"We want to use it to help children develop a sense of their local history. We also plan to create an online database and people will be able to come here to do private study."

The official opening will take place at 11am with residents invited to attend in the afternoon from 2pm.

For more information call Mr Cadogan on 613503 or email cardallcollection@hotmail.co.uk.