Angel Row Local History Forum: A new open local history forum for Nottingham

25 people came to the first Forum and took part in discussions about the future of Nottinghamshire Local history Association, open spaces and woodlands. Altogether, a good start. If you missed this meeting, please come along to the next Forum on Monday 16 May 2011. 1.30pm for a 2.00pm start. See you there.

20 people came to the 2nd Forum in May and heard Val Bird from Bramcote History Group talk about how they try to involve the local community in their activities and how they use a flowchart to help plan future events and monitor past performance (the chart is being published in the next issue of The Nottinghamshire Historian, due out late-September 2011). The other guest was Dorothy Richie from Angel Row Local Studies Library, who told the Forum about how the Doubleday collection of over 400,000 index cards is currently in the process of being microfiched.

The 3rd Forum was held on 5 September 2011 and attended by just 12 people, who heard Nottingham City Council's Archaeology Officer, Gordon Young, talk about his work. He explained how excavation work ('digs') are development driven, which often results in sites not be fully excavated. For example, the archaeology may be 2.5m down, but the dig has to stop at 2m because this is the depth of the developer's footings. The argument is that the archaeology will still be in situ undisturbed for future excavation. A lively discussion followed and it is a pity there were not more people there to enjoy it and learn in the process, but this was still an excellent meeting and captured the intended spirit of the Angel Row Local History Forums perfectly.

The 4th Forum on 7 December 2011 was a great success, when over thirty people saw a collection of films from the MACE collection showing Raleigh workers taking part in sports days and social events during the early-1950s. A further four meetings for 2012 are being arranged for March, May, September and December — see the Diary of Events section for more information. All are welcome and from March we plan to provide refreshments and biscuits as well.

The December 2012 Forum on the 12th was well attended and a wide range of topics were discussed from self-publishing to local history in China. We agreed to arrange four Forums in 2013 (dates to be arranged in the early-2013), one of which will be in the north of the county, with the aim of discussing the future role and organisation of Nottinghamshire Local History Association. We also discussed what motivated local historians to write and then want to publish their work, and the 'styles' adopted, from annotated books to popular periodicals. This led to a discussion about how local historians and societies engage with young people and the different ways people find into local history. The latter has prompted a separate entry, which I hope readers of this update to the Forum page will want to contribute to. The idea is that as many individuals as possible write about how they became actively interested in some aspect of history, be it a place, their family, a subject or an item. The possibilities seem endless once you ask the question, but by sharing our reminiscences about how we became involved, we may provide clues as to how history cum heritage can attract more participants at a time when many groups are in need of new volunteers and activists if they are to have a long-term future.