Cowper and Newton Museum

The Museum building is original to the Georgian era and is presented as it would have been when William Cowper was its resident in 1768 to 1786.

Selected friends were allowed to visit him in the unique building in the centre of the garden, which he described as his "verse manufacturey".

After the poet's death in 1800, admirers of his works visited this small "literary shrine" and many inscribed their names and dates on the walls and ceiling - the earliest found being 1802!

In July 2022, following the securing of funding from Milton Keynes City Council, the MK Community Foundation, the National Lottery Heritage Fund and Arts Council England, the town's Cowper and Newton Museum launched the "Amazing Grace 250" project to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Amazing Grace hymn, featuring a host of exhibitions and special events in Olney, the wider Milton Keynes area, and beyond.

[5] The vicarage is close by, where Cowper's friend and clergyman John Newton (1725–1807), wrote the hymn Amazing Grace.