‘Community Filmmakers’ is a documentary film project for residents of New Bolsover Model Village to capture the progress of the Heritage Lottery Funded conservation and regeneration project. On Wednesday 13 June, we met with residents and Film Director Chris Bevan to capture some of their experiences of life during the renovation work and aspirations for the future community, once the work has been completed. Local residents, Nicola and Angela, took us down to the Back to Roots community allotment and told us all about their plans to make it accessible to all with raised flower beds and wheelchair friendly pathways. They are currently growing a variety of vegetables and hope to rope in lots of support from other families on the Model so it is a valued place for the community.
Another highlight of the day was meeting Malcolm Spencer, the first miner to find a dragonfly fossil down Bolsover Colliery, in coal seam D4 in 1978. The dragonfly fossil had a wingspan of 20cm and was later declared a new species of dragonfly called the Erasipteron bolsoveri, dating over 300 million years old! Funnily enough, an even bigger fossil, with a wingspan of 50cm, was found later on that year, in the same seam. Malc has lived on the Model for over 60 years and remembers his working days down the pit and family life very fondly. He showed us some photos of all the competitions he used to enter, with trophies the size of punch bowls.
We also visited Sophie Turner, aged 12, who is currently decamped whilst her house is being renovated. Sophie told us about all of the exciting projects she has been doing in school and is really looking forward to moving back into a warmer home and having white walls (they used to be pink!)
The interviews will be included and edited into a first draft for the Heritage Open Day at the Model Village on Saturday 8 September 2018 where we will be recording celebratory activities throughout the day.
