Place Markers Scheme Helps Young People Reveal Historic Places
Historic England is working with young people to find new ways to mark and commemorate significant places that aren’t listed. Organisations will each get £7,000 to run their programmes.
If successful, the pilot scheme with under-25-year-olds could lead to a national place marker programme.
While plaques and information boards have traditionally been popular, Historic England is hoping these projects will provide new creative ways for people to celebrate local history.
It will allow communities to recognise important aspects of their heritage; from community-designed gardens, and painted murals to immersive digital walking trails. Groups will be given grant funding to recognise and celebrate their local history in permanent ways.
Run by Ignite Yorkshire, they worked with young people and an artist to create an immersive sound piece that tells the story of the covered canal in Bradford. “We want to celebrate the hidden history of Bradford Canal (1744-1922), now mostly built over. A short section, a few bridges and walls remain as curious anomalies in Shipley, home of our long-established youth partner organisation, Cactus Crew” Project.
Run by Mind the Gap, they will work with young people to create a large scale art work, using the letterpress at The People Powered Press at Salt Works in Shipley, that tells the stories of the people linked to the mill.
HerStory was delivered as part of the Heritage Doncaster research programme Changing The Record. Throughout 2022, community researchers explored the lives of women from Thorne, Mexborough and Edlington. A shortlist of six women was drawn up based on their research. A group of young people worked with illustrator Phil Sheppard and Heritage Doncaster staff to vote on which stories should be displayed on panels in their communities. Interpretation boards and short videos were created for three of the three selected women, Katy Richardson, Marie Singleton and Gill Coultard. The Herstory Placemarker is now live.
Evaluation will take place across all pilots that will inform us on how we might scale up the scheme further. Historic England is focussing on:
- how young people interact with and relate to heritage and the historic environment
- the feedback provided by the organisations involved to improve a scaled-up scheme
