Resilient Records

In 2019, the Record Office was awarded a grant by the National Lottery Heritage Fund for its Resilient Records project.

The project set out to widen the audience for the archive’s amazing range of historic documents, which date from the twelfth century, by learning how people who don’t currently use the archive would like to get involved and how the archive can support community groups achieve their objectives. The team worked with current and potential users of the archive to explore what they would like to see from the Record Office.

As part of the project, the Record Office appointed an Audience Development & Participation Officer who worked with a wide range of partner organisations, including young, older and vulnerable people, using archive material in a variety of ways.

In so doing, the project demonstrated the potential of archives to connect, engage and inspire people of all ages with each other and their local area, even in the most challenging of circumstances during the Covid-19 pandemic. Participants in the sessions and workshops commented that the activities “made the archives come to life”, that they “loved sharing stories and knowledge” and felt a very personal connection to the past.

Made in North Yorkshire

Made in North Yorkshire brought to life the resources held at the County Record Office, to capture the lives of important, but widely unknown people from across our county.

It focused on ten people from our history who have shown the resilience, strength, honesty, innovation and creativity that made North Yorkshire the special place it is today.

Each month featured one great North Yorkshire son or daughter, who was either born in the county or who moved here during their lifetime and made a positive change.

Read the features here: nycroblog/made-in-north-yorkshire

Unfolding Origins

Unfolding Origins will deliver a series of arts activities which aim to open up our archival resources to a wider public. With over 700 years of archival resources, the project will tell new stories about North Yorkshire’s people and places.

The project supports the creation of new artworks inspired by North Yorkshire’s archival collections and presents exciting new ways for the public to engage with this resource. The project is a collaboration between North Yorkshire County Record Office, Chrysalis Arts Development and other partners including Selby District Council, Richmondshire District Council and ArtUK and has secured funding from these partners alongside Arts Council England and the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Unfolding Origins will deliver a series of artists’ residencies, community engagement activities, an exhibition and a publication. The exhibition will take place in libraries and other venues across North Yorkshire, including isolated rural locations and the County Record Office in Northallerton. The overall project aims to enable new audiences, including volunteers, to access and enjoy these resources.

Attics and Acres

‘Attics and Acres’ focussed on the archive of the Graham family of Norton Conyers and was funded by Heritage Lottery Fund, Friends of the National Libraries and Northallerton and District Local History Society.

With the help of volunteers, the project archivist worked to make the archive accessible to all by developing an online catalogue and holding a series of talks, exhibitions and workshops. You can read the project blog here.

Home Comforts

The Heritage Lottery Funded ‘Home Comforts’ researched the history of the 32 Voluntary Aid Detachment Hospitals set up across the North Riding during the First World War. Up to 1,500 beds for the care of wounded soldiers returning from the front were provided in buildings as diverse as town hall, stately homes and workhouses, with local women taking the lead in organising this provision.

Project volunteers researched and wrote a 212 page, fully illustrated book telling the story of each of the hospitals and a programme of talks, exhibitions and activities reached over 4,000 people. The project was long-listed for the 2015 National Lottery Awards. You can learn about more projects at the Heritage Lottery Fund website.

Grounds for Appeal

In April 2016 the County Record Office was delighted to be awarded £8,500 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to make the North Riding Military Tribunal Papers 1916 –1918 widely available.

We hold nearly 6000 appeal papers of men who wished to defer their military service or who conscientiously objected to it. In 1921 the Board of Health issued instructions that all tribunal records be destroyed. There were two exceptions to this, Middlesex and Lothian and Peebles appeal records. These were retained as a benchmark for possible future use. By an oversight the North Riding Tribunal papers have survived.

You can read more at the following places:

• The Grounds for Appeal project blog
• Our historypin project board and our Flickr album
• The Heritage Lottery Fund website

Trawling through Time

For nearly 100 years Cochrane’s shipyard was a vital part of life in Selby. Opened by the then Beverley-based Andrew Cochrane, Cochrane and Sons became one of the most significant employers in the Selby region. In many cases, working at Cochrane shipyard was something that ran in the family, with generation after generation working at the yard. When the yard closed in 1993, not only did it result in the loss of hundreds of jobs, but it signalled the end of the shipbuilding tradition in Selby, a tradition which was first recorded in the 15th century. 

The company archive represents one of the most important pieces of evidence for the history of Selby. The North Yorkshire County Record Office was awarded a grant of £48,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to work on our project ‘Trawling Through Time’ which aimed to make this fascinating collection accessible to everyone.

You can view more images from the project on our Flickr album.