Centenary park offers new ‘gift’ for the future
STUART PIKE
LAST week marked exactly a century since the gifting of Gatty Park and Elmfield Hall to the people of Church.
To mark this summer’s centenary, an exciting new project will celebrate the history of the Green Flag awarded park and its Grade-II listed Elmfield Hall.
Heritage Lottery Funded (HLF) ‘Gatty’s Gift’ aims to engage the community in local history and heritage, fostering new skills in arts, research, event planning and oral history.
People in Church and the wider Hyndburn area are being sought to take part in the project, culminating in a community exhibition next year at the Haworth Art Gallery.
Leanne Taylor is enterprise development manager of Community Solutions, a charity tackling loneliness and social isolation which has been based at the hall since 2014.
She says the HLF will provide £39,954 over the full lifetime of the project, although some planned celebrations have fallen foul of the pandemic - including their annual summer party in the park which they had hoped to tie in with the anniversary.
Leanne said: “The fun day we do in July is one of our main fundraisers, but we’re not going to be able to do that this year.
“There is an exhibition at the Haworth Art Gallery that has been moved from September to early next year. The exhibition will then come back to Elmfield Hall and will stay there for a while.”
Local historian Gary Britland attended the hall last month to film a new video about the Gatty history.
An online coffee morning for people to find out more was held on Monday and will be repeated over the next two Fridays, July 3 and July 10. For the Zoom video links visit the Community Solutions Facebook page.
A socially distanced photo opportunity will also take place at 10.30am on Friday, July 10 (arrivals from 10.15am). A drone photo of the park and hall from above will be taken with members of the community asked to attend and stand two metres apart. Facemasks/gloves will be optional as they will be a visual representation of the times we are in.