Heritage & Contemporary Issues

Archive and Resources
As a result of researching different Documentary Arts projects over more than 30 years we have built up a considerable archive of primary source materials. There are more than 1,000 hours of taped reminiscence, the memories stretching back to before the turn of the century; slides, photographs, letters, diaries, newspaper articles and many other documents...more

Heritage & Contemporary Issues
Using people's lives and the events that have happened in our area we can bring together people of all ages and backgrounds. These projects value the contribution that original residents made to the area and give those who come here a sense of history and place. Living Archive is not only about looking back - it's about involving people in exploring contemporary issues that affect their present lives too.

My Milton Keynes
An important part of Living Archive's work is to make the hiostory of Milton Keynes and its people as widely accessible as mpossible. Most of this has been done by enabling people to acquire ICT skills to their own and other people's stories. The collection includes:

My Heritage
This project was a collaboration between English Heritage, Milton Keynes Council and Living Archive. The aim of the project was to collect stories and memories from people who have roots in, or have come from other countries to live in Milton Keynes '....more

My Roots My Music
This website was created by young people who worked with web designers to make web pages about their heritage. This website also includes a number of short films created by the young people and a trailer for the 'Merkin Time'....more

My Webpage
This website is a collection of stories and memories written by a group of learners on a creative IT course. All have made their own web pages using their life experiences, memories or hobbies as an inspiration. This project was made possible with funding from The Learning and Skills Council and presented by Living Archive.....more

My Railway Memories
This website is a collection of people’s memories, stories, photographs and extracts from taped interviews from people who have worked on, or used the railway at Bletchley. The project was funded by the Local Heritage Initiative in conjuction with Living Archive to document the Railway Heritage of Bletchley.....more

My Home Front
This website is a collection of people's memories, stories and extracts from taped interviews of life on the Home Front during World War Two. We held a 'Down Memory Lane' event and invited people to bring their photographs, memorabilia and most importantly their story.....more

My Memories
This website is a collection of stories and memories written by a group of mature learners on a creative IT course. All have made their own web pages using their life experiences and memories as an inspiration. This project was assisted with funding from Milton Keynes Community Foundation and presented by Living Archive....more

Digital Storytelling
Take a story well told, add images, music and sound - blend it together on a computer and you have a digital story. Living Archive has been pioneering digital storytelling with funding from the East of England Broadband Consortium....more

Multi Ethnic Milton Keynes
Milton Keynes is a community of immigrants: some have come from the north of England, some from London and the Southern Counties, but there are those who have travelled further to make this place their home. In the 1950’s people travelled from Pakistan ( now Bangladesh) and Italy to work in the Brickworks. Others have arrived more recently from Hong Kong and Somalia because of changes in their homelands. Milton Keynes is where they have come to live and work.

Multi Ethnic Milton Keynes, funded by the HLF Your Heritage scheme, was the first exhibition of its kind that showed this diversity and celebrated it with the rest of the community. It took place in April 2003 and was not just an exhibition: it was a multi sensory experience, featuring sound, visuals, food, dance, story telling and artefacts.

A website has also been created that gives young people more information about each of the featured countries, together with teachers' notes and information about the exhbition....more

Research & IT Training
We are a group of NVQ students who created these pages as part of our research into how the lives of people living in Wolverton and Bletchley were affected by WW2. We collected the information from original publications of the time and by interviewing local people who lived through those years.

For the Coffee Hall Project we researched the history and development of Milton Keynes and what life was like for its early residents. We got information from newspapers and pamplets published at the time and by interviewing local people who lived in Coffee Hall, which in 1973, was one of the first estates to be built in Milton Keynes... more

Bletchley Community Heritage Initiative
As part of our work the Spotlight on Bletchley regeneration programme volunteers have been collecting evidence of Bletchley's past and present history...more

The Hidden Languages of Milton Keynes - Wolverton Words
Year 7 of Bushfield Middle School worked to create a CD ROM and web pages showing their findings about the changes in the Wolverton accent. They interviewed 4 generations of people born and brought up in Wolverton asking them about their school days and childhood games... more

CLUTCH Club Websites
Between 1999 and 2001The Open University and Living Archive Millennium Awards Scheme involved 315 parents in researching local history and publicising their findings on the Web. The result is a series of 60 fascinating local history websites...more

The Letters of Albert French
Living Archive's contribution to the Jewels of Milton Keynes project are the letters of a boy soldier who left Wolverton to fight in the First World War and never returned...more

Days of Pride
Another contribution by Living Archive to the Milton Keynes Heritage Association website. This tells the story of Wolverton and New Bradwell from 1913-18 and includes 59 voice recordings, many of former soldiers who fought and survived the First World War...more