Our projects

The Easter Procession of Witness or Good Friday March as it was known to many, was a huge event in North Shields for many years.  It focussed around Northumberland Square as either a start or finish point with the procession taking place along the nearby streets watched by hundreds of onlookers.  We know that, in the 1960s, around 2,000 children would take part in the march before returning to their own churches to receive an orange as a gift.  However, very few records of this event exist, but people who remember taking part in this have now shared their memories, photographs and videos with us.

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When we meet people out in the community, particularly in men’s groups, the conversation almost always comes round to working life and there is a widely held view that the history of shipbuilding on the river has never been collected properly. In 2019 we were given an opportunity to fill in a couple of gaps in local knowledge by interviewing some people with experience of working in the yards.   If you follow this link you’ll be able to read and listen to some of the stories we collected thanks to the support of the Port of Tyne Authority.

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Romance in the Dome was such a wonderful project to be involved with. The volunteers met some wonderful people and heard wonderful stories. The highlight for the team was undoubtedly the day we interviewed contributors in the Dome itself, which was at that time a building site. It was a case of hard hats and high visibility jackets all the way – not the usual kit for recording memories. We still laugh about it now.

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Recollections of shops and shopping in North Shields in the 20th Century. Part of a series of booklets creating a 20th century history of life in North Tyneside from local people’s memories. Gannin Shoppin in Shields was one of our first big memory collection projects and we heard some amazing stories, if you follow the link you’ll find some of them and some more background to how the project came about. 

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Toys, Games and Sweets was one of our very early projects.  Moira, George, Les and Alick, residents of Clifton Court in West Monkseaton did the research and Alan and Kath of Remembering the Past collected the memories. Along the way we went to Beamish and the Toy Museum in Tynemouth to find out more about how the games were played and see original toys.  One memorable conversation we had at beamish concerned ‘boudy’ or pieces of broken pottery ware. People told us that, when they were children, they used it as pretend money when they were playing shops. There is a boudy collection in Beamish which was really interesting to see.

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Taking the Plunge was a super project to work on and some of the stories we heard were amazing.  We were able to hear beautiful stories about swimming in the local outdoor pools that used to exist along our coastline.  The main thing we heard about was how cold the water was and how nice hot Bovril was when you came out.

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Boots, Blades, Pucks and Patches was a project that took us into unknown territory, literally.  The idea was a simple one; to collect memories of ice skating. What none of the team had factored in was that it is cold in an ice rink.  The team need to be congratulated for their level of endurance during this project. You just never know where the next memory is coming from.

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In March 2006 a group of residents of Eccles Court, Backworth got together to reminisce about the Easter traditions that they remembered taking part in.  Here you can find out more about the project, meet the people who took part and enjoy reading their stories.

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This was the second in the ‘Traditions’ series to be produced. In partnership with GIFTT (now Bridging the Gap) we ran a series of memory collecting workshops in Emerson Court, Shiremoor. We especially remember an afternoon spent making Christmas decorations. Here you can find out more about the project, meet the people who took part and enjoy reading their stories. It is a great read and a tribute to all those who served our country at that time.

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During 2006 six men who had experienced life in the National Service during the post 1945 period got together to remember that time. The booklet which you can read here is the result of that work.

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A project from 2007 when a group of people gathered over a few weeks to talk about their working lives.  Here you can see the booklet which was prepared from all the material which was collected.

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During 2007 we were privileged to work with police historian Ken Banks as he wrote his book ‘Off Beat’.  Here you can see the booklet which was prepared for visitors to the launch and exhibition which accompanied the book.

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