Aycliffe Village

As I mentioned before, the History Society Exhibition was visited by local podcaster Alisdair today. The podcast is now online, it is an hour long, and you can listen to it here. (Just click on the Play Now button). There are some excellent interviews in the show. Many thanks, Alisdair. I’ll be copying the show to CD for anybody who isn’t up to speed with podcasts (once I get permission from Alisdair) and making sure that everybody who wants to hear it can get to hear it. Just ask a committee member for a copy.

Update:

Alisdair has given me permission to record the podcast on a CD, with a few provisos. He is also going to provide a high quality recording of the interview sections of the show, to give to the History Society and to post online here.

I’ve just come from the Village Hall, at the close of day two of Aycliffe Village History Society’s exhibition. I’d called in earlier today, and the hall was as full of people at 4 o’clock as it was at 12 noon. Ex-Aycliffe Village Primary School Headmaster and History Society member Harry Moses revisited old times when he had to ring the bell twice to get visitors to leave the hall!

There were more than 200 visitors on the first day of the exhibition, and by lunchtime today well over 100 people had dropped in. The final number of visitors isn’t yet known, but it is expected to be around 500.

Many people spent hours poring over old documents, press clippings, photgraphs and maps. Even more people had brough items of interest, either related to the village in general, or to the Royal Ordnance Factory in particular. The scanner and photocopier were in operation all day, with visitors able to request copies of documents, photographs and maps, for a nominal fee.

Some folks enjoyed the opportunity to have a cup of tea and a scone, and reminisce with other villagers.

The exhibition was visited by Alisdair from the Great Aycliffe Podcast and he interviewed several members of the History Society for his next podcast. Once that show is online, I’ll post a link here.

All in all, an excellent weekend and a great success!

As more photographs and information are forthcoming, I’ll add them here.

There was a great full page article in The Northern Echo yesterday about part of the history of Aycliffe Village. It also publicised our history weekend, and there were thanks for Harry Moses and David Lewis. Well done chaps! If the article appears online, I’ll link to it on this page.

A podcast is a type of radio show that is produced on a computer and can be listened to on a computer or on an mp3 player. There are thousands of podcasts available, but one that might interest our readers is called the Aycliffe Podcast (Aycliffe in this case means Great Aycliffe) Take a listen   http://www.aycliffepodcast.com/

1. Julian Lenahan said,

   September 6, 2006 @ 8:55 am · Edit

   Over the last couple of weeks,the contractors have been finishing off the alterations to the village hall – which have enabled us to provide a disabled access toilet, revamp the old male & female toilets and create a new kitchen (as the old one had seen better days!).
   We are now at the final stages of the alterations, painting, filling and the obligatory “throwing out of tat” stage. I would like to thank all of the committee members (and especially those villagers who aren’t on the committee) who attended to paint, clean, move and make refreshments etc. Additionally I would like to thank the youth of the village for pitching in – showing that when asked, they can make a valuable contribution!!!
   The computer suite is also in the final stages of being set up, so hopefully we’ll have a hall that is able to serve the needs of the village – at every age!