History Begins at Home
History Begins at Home is a wellbeing project, which uses archives to prompt intergenerational chats, was set-up with NorAH’s support.
The featured image is a screenshot from a wonderful, short film produced by the Norfolk-based History of Advertising Trust on cars. It is made up of extracts from car adverts and encourages reminiscences about cars once owned and driven.
Background
The project is led by the Norfolk Record Office but is used nationwide. History Begins at Home started as a response to the COVID-19 lockdowns of spring 2020. Archivists at the NRO and elsewhere were conscious that lots of remote conversations were taking place, especially with isolated and elderly people. They were also aware people wanted to talk about things which weren’t coronavirus related.
As we all became more confident with video chat applications such as Zoom, the NRO, together with the wider archive community believed their rich holdings, especially those which had already been digitised, could be used to help people’s wellbeing.
Resources
History Begins at Home has its own website on which it post resources which can be used prompt conversations. To date, there are 75 questions sheets on a wide variety of topics, such as school days, fashion, transport, and the high street. Most of the images are from the collections of the Norfolk Heritage Centre or the Norfolk Record Office, many of which are on Picture Norfolk. In addition to the question sheets are three videos on cars, food and hobbies featuring items from a variety of archive services, including the Norfolk-based History of Advertising Trust, Gwent Archives, Kresen Kernow (‘Cornwall Centre’) and others.
Even though the COVID-19 lockdowns are becoming a memory for most of us, people are still using and enjoying its resources. As well as the website, they can be accessed on the History Begins at Home Facebook site and on X. New resources are being posted on a regular basis.
The History Begins at Home website also contains advice on how to capture and preserve the conversations prompted by its resources.
Why NorAH supported History Begins at Home?
NorAH was keen to support History Begins at Home for many reasons. The Charity believes heritage, and especially archives, can be a fantastic enabler for the five steps to mental wellbeing. In this case archives are being used to connect people, learn something new, and giving to others. Even though the project has a reach beyond the county’s boundaries, NorAH wanted to support a Norfolk-based initiative which used Norfolk archives to create its resources.
