Yorkshire’s Forgotten WW1 Family Stories.
Europeana 1914-18 World War One Family History Roadshow
British Library, Boston Spa, Wetherby, West Yorks, LS23 7BQ Saturday, August 2, 2014 11.00am – 5.00pm
Do you have a box hidden deep in the attic or under the bed that holds your great grandfather’s diaries from 1914-1918? His army medals? Or a photo with a special story behind it?
If so, it could be part of a unique European WW1 project, shared worldwide to commemorate the centenary of the outbreak of the war.
The British Library’s northern site at Boston Spa has joined forces with Europeana – Europe’s most important online resource for cultural heritage. We will be working together to gather and tell people’s family stories from 1914-1918. These valuable stories will then be shared via Europeana’s online archive – www.europeana1914-1918.eu
We need people to bring photographs, letters, diaries, film or audio recordings, together with the stories of whom they belonged to and why they are important to their families to the Europeana 1914-1918 Family History Roadshow at the British Library, Boston Spa on Saturday, August 2.
Historians and experts from the York Museums Trust, Lancaster University and local history societies will be on hand to talk about the significance of finds, while staff from the British Library will professionally digitise the objects which will be uploaded to the dedicated Europeana 1914-1918 website.
If people aren’t able to get to the event in Boston Spa, the Europeana 1914-1918 website gives advice on how to can scan, photograph and upload material at home.
Visitors on the day will also have a chance to discover the British Library’s newly refurbished Boston Spa Reading Room, where you can consult the Library’s vast collection of research journals, books and periodicals, along with free access to more than 8 million pages of digitised historic newspapers.
There will also be a range of WW1 themed activities, including local curator talks from experts at The Castle Museum, York, film screenings from the Yorkshire Film Archive and a WW1 brass band.