The folksong Babes in the Wood sung by The Copper Family

A very old traditional folk song about the 'Babes in the Wood' that has spread around the world with settlers from England. This song and variations on it can be found in America and Australia.

Do You Want to Capture Our Local Oral History? Book Now for the Free BBC Workshop on April 20th

The COWH project is very pleased to have five places available on the BBC workshop 'Audio Interview Recording Skills' at the Forum Studios, Norwich on 20th April from 11.00 am - 13.00 pm.  Book now for two hours of training by BBC experts  in audio interviewing skills, with advice on operating recording equipment. This is your chance to aquire the skills to get out there and start recording the unique memories of local Wayland people, so they will not be lost forever.  Email sue@wayland.org.uk to book your place.

Bayeux Tapestry Video

I have added this video to the blogsite as a nice example of a different way of interpreting a well known part of our heritage.


The Bayeux Tapestry
Uploaded by dekku. -

Wood Rising Bell

Wood Rising Bell
Originally uploaded by suewhite

Short video of the ringing of the Wood Rising Bell on the church open day in 2009.

Wood Rising - Church Barrel Organ

The organ was built in 1862 by Flight & Robson; restored 1957; one barrel replaced 1960. Repertoire of 30 "hymns". It was filmed being played at the church open day in 2009.

Evening Sunshine at Merton Park , Wayland, Norfolk

A short film shot in the beautiful early evening sunshine at Merton.

Queens Hall - Souvenir Programme 1956

Following the Wayland Heritage Discovery Day at Queens Hall last Friday it seemed a good time to start looking at the history of the hall. We are lucky that a copy of the original 1956 souvenir programme has survived in Lesley Cowling's family collection of Wayland documents. The three pages that give a history of what was then called 'Watton Coronation Hall' have been added here. The full programme has been scanned and can now be read online (in the window above) and downloaded from Google Docs, if you click on the small icon top right in the window above you can see it in a larger window, click on File, top right, and you can download it free from there.

If anyone can give some of their time to help scan documents like this please, get in touch with the project heritage officer  sue@wayland.org.uk

Heritage Drop-ins on Wednesday Afternoons - dates for March 2010

The March 2010 dates for the Wednesday 'Heritage drop-in Afternoons' 2 - 4pm at Wayland House, Watton are 3rd, 10th and 17th March

Pop-in to find out more about the project.

Come in and pick up some tips on how to research your local history on-line.  View your village from the air with Google Earth and discover archaeological features from the air.

We need volunteers for scanning and recording historical photos and documents of Watton, Wayland and the Battle Area, could you help us record the past for the future

If you have a topic you would like to research or a local story to tell which you would like to pass on to future generations we would be happy to help.

Thank you to everyone that came to the 'Wayland Heritage Discovery Day'

Thank you to everyone that came to the Discovery Day on Friday. As you can see from the photo on the left we had a good time. All the hard work of the local heritage, needlecraft and photographic groups made it a very interesting and enjoyable day.

We were luck to be able to have John Lord demonstration the ancient art of flint working all through the day as part of the 'Wayland Heritage Discovery Day'. The speed and skill with which he works the flint is amazing. Visit his website to find out more about his work and where else you can see him flintknapping www.flintknapping.co.uk

Dr John Davies's talk on 'Boudica's Norfolk' ended the 'Wayland Heritage Discovery Day', with a wonderful fresh look at Iron Age Norfolk. Covering some of the results that new research and discoveries are revealing about our county. The Ashill and Saham Toney within the Wayland area may prove to be of particular importants.  Dr Davies has recently published to books on Boudica's Norfolk.

Again many thanks to all of you that attended.