RAF Hemswell was located on the site from 1937 until it closed in 1967.[citation needed] The airfield site was subsequently redeveloped into a private trading estate and the RAF married quarters into a residential area which became a newly created civil parish of Hemswell Cliff. The old village of Hemswell remains as a separate parish.[citation needed]
The RAF sold the community centre (originally built as the Sergeants' Mess) in 2009 but it remained unused until 2021 when the Broadcast Engineering Conservation Group, a charity, bought it. They began to repair 12 years of decay and started to create the Broadcast Engineering Museum.[1][2] The group held its first public open days in September 2022.[3]