Our regular volunteers definitely made the best of a bad summer, visiting site on the 13th, 20th, and 27th July, and 3rd, 10th, 17th, and 31st August.
We also had some special visitors on Friday 5th July, and Weds 21st August but more of that anon…
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What a month! Mostly highs, with the odd low; new life on site, beautiful weather, a new monarch, and lots of activity from the Friends of Hemingfield Colliery, as we completed work on our National Lottery Heritage Fund project Hemingfield’s Hidden History. The project has reunited the colliery site – pumping station and pump house cottage, and enabled a transformation of our understanding of the history and importance of the surviving buildings. Working together with others, we have uncovered more of the stories of the communities around the pit, at Elsecar and Hemingfield, and connected with a new generation of young people on the heritage and biodiversity of the former colliery site today .
April 2023 saw a host of activities on site, as the weather tried, time after time, to confound and confuse. For the Friends it was a month of Open Days at Easter; of gardening and tidying, and of preparation for better days to come, or at least better weather on the many working days to come.
Continue readingThis blog covers highlights from this year, ranging from achievements on site, community engagement and covering some of the goals we may like to achieve in 2023.
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June 2022 was another busy month of weekend activities on site at Hemingfield Colliery, although the first weekend presented a unique pause – the Platinum Jubilee Bank Holiday weekend from Thursday 2nd June 2022.
Continue readingHow lucky we are to be out in the countryside! The post-industrial semi-rural greenery abounding around Hemingfield and Elsecar.
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Picking up from our previous update at the end of March, you might be forgiven for thinking that the seasons had jumped, with winter returning, as snow fell on site on the morning of 31st March; the pit briefly donning a white cloak, before warmer air, and the green shoots of Spring began to emerge more fully.
Continue readingWell, it wasn’t perhaps the most auspicious weather to kickstart a new year of work on site: Saturday 15th January 2022 saw cold foggy skies and icy ground conditions. And yet, there’s a lot to write about: where there is a will…
Continue reading“It was a beautiful autumn morning. Such days come seldom at this season of the year in Yorkshire. When they do come one enjoys them all the more.”
Mexborough & Swinton Times, 3rd November 1906, p.11
And so it was on Saturday 13th November 2021, 115 years later; another beautiful autumn morning. The Friends and volunteers arrived early for another productive day’s activities at Hemingfield Colliery.
Continue readingA short update from a busy weekend on site with visits and volunteers coming and going throughout the day. Sunshine casts more light than heat now, as autumn sheds the trees’ summer coat, and we all begin to wrap up ever more. Plenty of work in hand, at Pump House Cottage and around the site supporting our National Lottery Heritage Fund Hemingfield’s Hidden Heritage project. Thanks to National Lottery players for saving and sustaining our heritage.
Friends of Hemingfield Colliery 