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The National Lottery Heritage Fund – Value our History
The National Lottery Heritage Fund is the largest funder for the UK’s heritage.
Using money raised by National Lottery players we support projects that connect people and communities to heritage. Our vision is for heritage to be valued, cared for and sustained for everyone, now and in the future. From historic buildings, our industrial legacy and the natural environment, to collections, traditions, stories and more. Heritage can be anything from the past that people value and want to pass on to future generations. We believe in the power of heritage to ignite the imagination, offer joy and inspiration, and to build pride in place and connection to the past.
Using money raised by National Lottery players, The National Lottery Heritage Fund supports projects that connect people and communities with the UK’s heritage.Valuing Our Heritage is made possible with The National Lottery Heritage Fund. Thanks to National Lottery players, we have been able to begin to research and preserve the history of Bolton Deaf Society.
Find out more about the National Lottery Heritage Fund here
About The Project
Our heritage project is vast and includes a variety of aspects:
- Research: Local history, significant people, photos, awards
- Oral history: Video recordings of our deaf community discussing their past experiences
- Reenactments: Including a trip out and some gathered celebrations, stimulating memories of times gone by
- Theatre Production: Including some drama workshops and a performance
- Pop-up exhibition: Liaising with our local museum to create a pop-up deaf exhibition
- Murals: Art directed by an artist and created by our deaf community to be displayed in our center
- Videos: Shorter TikTok videos and a project summary film
- Training: Delivering some deaf awareness training to local organisations, including the museum for better access to all
See below for more details.
Research
Lead by history expert Bryony Rigby, the research went deep covering a wide range of archive diving including newspaper & TV articles, photos & more; creating a local deaf timeline dating back to 1800’s.
Did you know the first national deaf newspaper started right here in Bolton? Started by Ernest Ayliffe in 1905. You can still read the British Deaf Newspaper but today it is online. Learn more about this and see a replica copy from 1910 on display in our center.
Some photo’s from the research can also be seen in the gallery section.
Reenactments
Our reenactments included a Christmas celebration with deaf church minister and Handmade sign choir; Santa gave the children deaf related books as gifts.
Sports competitions with trophies for the winners. Sports have played a big part in deaf history. Locally there was a Grand Athletic Fair in July 1892, over 100 deaf athletes took part in activities such as cycling, boxing, gymnastics, clown football and greasy pole climbing.
Reenactments also included a trip out and we took our group to visit the Deaf Heritage Museum, owned by British Deaf Association based in Manchester.
The trip was a stimulating experience for all who attended, the tour was delivered in British Sign Language and thoroughly enjoyed by all.
Murals
Detachable art murals designed by Chris of OurAlison.com and created by our community to capture our past and remind people to feel proud of our deaf heritage.
The elephant depicts our proud roots in Bolton as we grow to reach the wider community.
Artwork will be on display in our center.
Pop-up exhibition
A pop-up exhibition will be held in Bolton Museum with the launch on Thursday 18th June at 4.30pm. We hope to see you there.
The BDS 'Value our History' project - Oral history
Colin - Oral History BDS interviews
Gerard - Oral History BDS interviews
Fazina - Oral History BDS interviews
