The King's Ear

In 2006 St. Joseph's School, Loftus celebrated its 100th birthday and made a film about life in Loftus in 1906, the children did all the acting, all the filming and helped write the script. The film was made in just two and a half days at eight different locations around Loftus and cost nothing to make; unfortunately we had little time for editing before the premiere, so the sound could have been better.

In 1906, our MP Herbert Samuel was also the Home Secretary, he was at first against giving women the vote, but after the Great War he changed his mind, he later gave woman the right to become MPs. (From the book People of the past in Loftus by Eric M. Jackson.)

The Accident

In 2003 we worked with 20 children from Hummersea Primary School, Loftus and made a film called The Accident, the film was based on one of the stories from the East Cleveland Memories project,about hero "Abe." The film won the Roots and Wings award, the award was presented to us in The Royal Society of Arts building in London by Estelle Morris M.P. Minister for the Arts and by Loyd Grossman.





Photos from the film, premiere and the award.

East Cleveland Memories

In 2001 I was one of five volunteers who started an oral history group called East Cleveland Memories. We recorded stories of local people, and with the help of a local museum and a Newcastle based group called Tomorrow's History, we put some of these stories on the Internet. With the help of a printer from the local church, we published 300 hundred books.

Hear some of the stories on the Tomorrow's History website;