Share your stories - west Cumbria £100k heritage project launched

The Kirkgate Arts and Heritage project has been largely funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and will include creating an oral history archive of people’s stories.

Called In My Shoes, a series of events, including storytelling, theatre and music, will be held in community centres and village halls. The hope is these will inspire people to come forward and share their stories.

Volunteers are being trained up to collect oral histories.

There will be two exhibitions staged by Cockermouth Heritage Group, one of which will draw on stories from the oral history collection.

Kirkgate Youth Theatre is also playing its part.

Kirkgate Youth Theatre perform at Cockermouth Castle (Image: Chris Lewis)

Kirkgate manager Emma Heys said: "It's about giving people the opportunity to understand what their cultural heritage is.

"It's incredibly important for west Cumbria.

"On the surface we have a very white county and some people can feel excluded.

"While we want to hear from people who were born and brought up here who might not realise how unique certain aspects of their life are we also want to hear stories from recent refugees, immigrants and people who have relocated."

The youth theatre did their first performance at Cockermouth Castle as part of the recent Cockermouth Live!

"The younger group did a piece inspired by their own experiences and about understanding their own identity," said Emma.

"The older group created a story about a family - an amalgamation of all the different members of the group.

"They will continue to work on this and an expanded format will be performed again at Christmas."

The plan is to do a piece inspired by the oral histories for Cockermouth Live! next year.

The heritage group's first exhibition, in November, will focus on Miller's shoe factory.

"We have commissioned some story tellers and spoken word artists focusing on cultural heritage for a series of events running from September to March," said Emma.

"People will be invited to come forward and share their oral histories.

"We have trained a whole set of volunteers to collect them, the hope is we will be able to create an atmosphere where people feel really comfortable."

The Heritage Lottery Fund has committed £98,000 to the project, a further £5,000 has come from The Francis C Scott Charitable Trust and £250 from the Arts Society.

People wanting to record an oral history should contact emma@thekirkgate.com.