Your stories

I came in two months before we actually opened and I didn’t really know what Jorvik was all about, so it was all very strange to me. When I arrived they were building the street, which was part of a large city. To see all this street below ground was quite amazing.

Queues for Jorvik in 1984

We were due to open on 14th April 1984. At the time we had no idea what the public response was going to be to this type of museum because it was a new concept. The day before we opened, we worked right through the night. We opened at 11am and thought we might get about 200 people who’d like to be there on the first day, with it being a new museum. More than 2000 people turned up!

We didn’t expect it to continue but, in the height of summer, we had to make the last admission eight o'clock at night – people were still queuing. In the first year we weren’t far short of a million visitors.

The wonderful thing about Jorvik is we’re actually on the site of the excavation and that makes all the difference. The visitor is going over the actual site and they’ve more or less put every house back in its original position.

People think they’re going through a village but they’re not, they’re going through a small section of a very large city. Between 10 and 15 thousand people lived here, it was the second largest city in the country.

After 16 years and 12.5 million visitors the ride was all worn out, we knew we were going to have to replace it. We decided to shut down for five months, replace the ride and refurbish.

We were very fortunate; the church next door, St Mary’s, was empty, so we set up there. It was a different experience. People were arriving who hadn’t a clue we’d closed so we had something to show them. It was a success, we got far more visitors than we’d thought.

We were due to re-open on the 14th April 2001, exactly the same date as the first time around. However, by the 7th April we were all up and ready to go, so we opened a week early.

Tony at work

The ride is a lot better and it’s larger downstairs. People should come again and again because we’re always changing things – we can’t be left behind because modern technology advances so fast and we’ve got to keep up with it.

I am a visitor host, one of the first people the visitors meet downstairs. I'm actually called Time Machine Tony, because that’s my place of work for most of the day!

Famous people I’ve met include Prince Charles and Raine Spencer, Princess Diana’s step-mother. She was wonderful, really made me feel at ease. I've also met Tony and Cherie Blair who, along with Michael Wood, were here on the first day of the new Jorvik experience in April 2001.

A lot of famous people just join the queue. They don’t ring up and say “Look I’m so-and-so can I have a VIP visit?” Jean Alexander, Hilda Ogden from Coronation Street, she joined the queue. I met Zoe Wanamaker's father, Sam Wanamaker, who was a lovely gentleman. We get a lot of footballers, the Manchester United goalkeeper, van der Sar, came the other week. He just joined the queue and came in!

I retire in August, so I’m going to miss it all. I’ve loved the ride, I’ve loved every minute of the journey. I’ve certainly learnt about the history of York because, even though I’m York born and bred, I never knew anything about the history of the city. I’ve learnt about the Romans, the Saxons and the Normans, not only the Vikings. The history of York is the history of England and the city is just fantastic.

I recently won a wonderful accolade, 'the front of house' award in the York Tourism Awards, which I’m delighted with. I'm very honoured and it’s a lovely way to finish.

It’s a wonderful place and I’m sure it will still be here in another 25 years. It’s a combination of a wonderful team: the management, marketing, the interactive costume visitor hosts – the Vikings, and the shop staff. A lot of people work here and it’s that combination which makes my job worthwhile.

I’m going to miss them all but I’ve got 25 years of happy memories.

Tony Morgan Taylor