Share your stories and celebrate the cut
TWO Black Country women have launched a project to celebrate one of the region’s most important waterways, the Dudley No 2 Canal.
It’s called Walking Through Waterways History, and organisers Heather Wastie and Sam Frankie Fox aim to involve the local community in gathering material for an audio trail celebrating that stretch of the cut, between Windmill End Junction and Hawne Basin, an area once lined with industry, including the huge Stewarts & Lloyds where more than 2,000 people worked.
Campaigning
Heather was involved with her family in campaigning for the restoration of the canals from the 1960s onwards, while Sam is a vocalist, harpist, theatre maker and sound designer. They have been commissioned by Creative Black Country to run the project to engage and connect local people during lockdown.
As Alarum Theatre, they specialise in telling true life stories of the UK canals and bringing history to life, through performances, publications and recordings. In 2019/20, Alarum ran a project in the Black Country called I Dig Canals, making oral history recordings with women involved in campaigning and restoration in the 1960s and 70s.
Boats
These original stories include references to towing old Stewarts & Lloyds boats through Gorsty Hill Tunnel; the poor condition of Hawne Basin and how local councillors were taken on boat trips to be entertained and educated about the vital work of preserving the canals.
New memories will be added to these snippets, together with
a soundscape to bring the area to life. The finished product will then be available for people to listen to whilst walking along the canal or as a way of transporting anyone from anywhere in the world to this unique Black Country landscape, rich in history.
Do you have stories of living and working in the area around this section of canal? Heather and Sam would love to hear from you. Please get in touch with your memories by emailing yourmemories@alarumproductions.org.uk. For more,
see Alarum Theatre on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and their website www.alarumtheatre.co.uk.
Women
Alarum specialise in retelling stories of ordinary, often invisible, women. Their show ‘Idle Women of the Wartime Waterways’ tells the stories of female trainees who operated pairs of cargo-carrying boats during World War II. Since 2016 they have taken the show across the UK, giving well over
a hundred performances at a variety of venues, their aim being to take theatre out into the community.
Their latest show, Acts of
Abandon, began touring in 2020 and their I Dig Canals project is ongoing. To find out more visit www.alarumtheatre. co.uk.