Volunteers bring history alive (From The Westmorland Gazette)

Volunteers bring history alive

9:30pm Wednesday 17th March 2010 in

• Skip social links
• Print
• Email
• Comments(0)

Although the Save the Armitt campaign hit its £10,000 target last week the five-figure sum will only bridge the funding gap in the short-term.

The hard-working trust continues in earnest with its fund-raising appeal to put the Ambleside reference library and museum on a firmer financial footing and secure its future.

Cheques are flowing into the Armitt from far and wide but as well as money the Armitt also needs more volunteers.

Adrian Mullen takes a look at what being a volunteer involves.

Jill Butterworth is one of the committed and highly-prized team of Armitt volunteers.

She says the Armitt is a great place to work.

Jill said: “It is always fun travelling, and ‘time-travelling’ in one’s own home town is even more fun.

“Armitt volunteers bring varied skills and interests to the job – computing, modern painting, scientific or historical training, local knowledge, or simply, and above all, enthusiasm, which is not hard in such a place.”

Jill usually volunteers for one day a week and arrives for work at 10am.

She said: “The day can bring great variety, planned and unplanned.

“It could involve a primary school group ‘doing’ the Romans, where the children can handle real Roman objects, which came from the walls of the Roman fort at Waterhead, or helping people fill in their genealogical tree.

“There is also the basic housekeeping to be done – cataloguing and caring for the books and photographs, artefacts and paintings, always learning more and linking the stories of the people who gave them with the history of the objects and the community.

“There’s great pleasure in helping visitors find things and sharing their enthusiasm.

“My work was in Arabic and other Near Eastern languages, mainly at Cambridge University Library.

“It taught me to appreciate the value and the care of specialist collections, and, in the Armitt, Ambleside, has a very special one of its own.”

l Anyone interested in volunteering should telephone 015394-31212. The Armitt is open 10am-4pm, Monday to Saturday.