The Old Garage Excursion-Exhibition Project Retro-Technology Museum

The museum was created on the basis of the private collection of N.V. Lushin and exhibits of like-minded members of the Crew Club of retro technology lovers.

He began to collect the exhibits when he was in school. There was a time when he abandoned the hobbies and items were sent to the far corners of the garage and to the attic. When his interest returned, the things were pulled back out. His interest was strengthened while participating in ICOM meetings and working at the People’s Museum during the creation of the Myshkinskiy Self-Propelled Museum there and the organization of a festival of the same name.

There is a rich collection of agricultural machinery, trucks, cars, and motorcycles, among them the pre-war “lorry” GAZ-AA, the front-line worker ZIS-5, the Russian Black Martinet GAZ-M1 (the legendary EMka), the front-line ally, an American Willis, and much more. The equipment is very diverse, there are even river vessels! A lot of equipment is quite unusual, from a steam locomotive and an aircraft turbine to lemonade and sausage machines from the 19th century.

You can touch a lot of the exhibits and if you’re lucky, you can even see them in action or sit at the levers and behind the steering wheel of a vehicle.

You can order separately a demonstration of cars and motorcycles in action. You will hear the sound of motors from the 20th century and can take pictures behind the wheel with the attributes of that era. If the opportunity presents itself, you can drive an old piece of technology.

The museum received its status and name in 2005. This was preceded by a large and difficult work on the formation and restoration of funds, which today constitutes a valuable and multifaceted collection of material evidence of technical history and engineering.

Nikolai Vladimirovich Lushin started actively collecting the equipment exhibits in 1996 on the basis of the Myshkinsky People’s Museum. The Myshkin Club of Local History of the Myshkin People’s Museum Council of Founders approved and supported this initiative.

In 1998, the collection was called the “exposition of antique technology” and consisted of 80 units, of which retro transport represented 7. This exposition organically complemented the collection of the People’s Open Air Museum. In the same year, the first self-propelled annual festival of retro-technology was held.