The Preston Historical Society (P.H.S.) is extremely pleased to announce the launch of our recent ‘Big Lottery’ funded outreach project known as ‘Reaching Out To The Community’.

With the success of receiving a grant from the Big Lottery Fund, the P.H.S. has been able to purchase the sound and vision equipment necessary in order to bring the project plans to fruition and have now completed their first month of outreach events.

The idea of the ‘Reaching Out To The Community’ project was conceived by thinking of a way to take local history out to people of the community who, for various reasons, would not normally be able to attend the evening meetings of the PHS at the  St. John’s Minster on Church Street, Preston.

It became apparent that nursing homes, sheltered housing establishments and local community centres, accommodating for infirm, disabled and the more senior members of society, would be ideal venues for this particular project.

During July 2013 we have been able to attend five events with the first part of a series of presentations called ‘The Changing Face Of Preston’, which consists of a slide show of Preston present and past related images and an accompanying talk on the subject.

Paul Swarbrick, a committee member who is currently delivering the talks and presentations said, “The response from people has been absolutely overwhelming. What has become apparent is that most of those attending the presentations are mainly local to Preston and the surrounding areas, which means they relate to the past scenes and images of what was the town of their youth, leading to striking up interactive conversation.”

A carer at one of the events remarked on the great impression that the presentation had made on a particular person who is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, “It appeared as though the images had triggered memories which the person recalled from their past life reactivating those memories for a brief time.”

The P.H.S. Archivist, Gill Lawson said, “It will all be worthwhile if we can bring a little joy in reminiscencing the past lives and experiences of the people attending the presentations.” Another P.H.S. committee member, Pete Wilkinson, who is advising on various parts of the project said, “Our aim is to keep the presentations to a very social and nostalgic level so that people can hopefully be entertained and maybe even learn a few historic facts along the way.”

The ‘Reaching Out To The Community’ project is scheduled to serve the community for twelve months but hopefully, with the appropriate resources, we will endeavour to carry on this work for a longer period.

If you are involved with a residential care home or similar establishment and have appropriate facilities such as a community centre, community lounge or a large meeting room and you would like to take advantage of our project, then please contact us for further details.

You can email the P.H.S. Secretary, Karen Doyle at kd@pdprojects.co.uk

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