By Penny Thompson, Community Organiser
I’ve recently been supporting a local resident called Alan Tunstill who came up with the idea to set up a heritage group around East Herringthorpe. Alan has been a resident for many years, he also wanted to celebrate 100 years of social housing. Alan wanted the group to be inclusive of residents who currently lived there but had also moved on from the area, or family members who have memories from the area.
I supported Alan by designing a poster and promoted this on East Herringthorpe past and present Facebook page as well as Rotherham Federation’s Facebook page. We linked in with Chapel on the bridge as they already run a successful heritage group and they have agreed to advise the group.
Once other members began to attend, I supported the group by helping them agree what the groups aims, and objectives would be. The groups aim is to celebrate all forms of heritage around East Herringthorpe, this would include a timeline as well as schooling, activities/groups that where run in the area this would also include memoirs and photographs.
The group has grown in strength as well as numbers and are now meeting on a monthly basis. The group hope to formalise the future as a constituted community group. The objective is to then raise funds and apply for funding for all information to be displayed at Clifton museum as well as to be published within a book. From linking in with Clifton Museum it was identified by staff that there are currently no books on the heritage of East Herringthorpe and that they would be delighted to have something on their records.