From 1st-7th October 2024, the ‘outside it is beautiful’ team met local groups and commuters on and around the Bentham Line, as well as running a series of free arts activity sessions.
‘outside it is beautiful’ is a brand-new community-focused digital audio stories project about nature and local history, set on the Bentham Line (Leeds-Morecambe Community Rail Partnership) which runs the 75 miles between Leeds and Morecambe.
Curated by writer/journalist, photographer and film-maker, Verity Healey; playwright, poet and writer for BBC Radio 4’s The Archers, Sarah Hehir; and Yorkshire based writer, educator, performer and facilitator, Becky Cherriman, ‘outside itis beautiful’ aims to connect rail passengers with stories inspired and written by local people and places via an audio app which can be accessed by travellers on the Bentham Line.
Ahead of its official public launch in 2025 to mark both the 175th anniversary of the Bentham Line and the 200th anniversary of the modern railway in Britain, the ‘outside it is beautiful’ team held a week of activity between 1st-7th October led by Sarah Hehir and Becky Cherriman in Bolton-le-Sands, Holbeck, Morecambe and Skipton.
This was in partnership with local organisations along the Bentham line, which will culminate in the creation of a brand-new audio adventure, written by Sarah Hehir, to launch in November. The project was supported by Arts Council England through its National Lottery Project Grants Programme, the Northern Community Fund and in kind by Culturapedia and the CRP.
The sessions were free and open to all. Participants were encouraged to come and share some of their favourite places, wildlife sightings and memories on the Bentham Line through a range of arts activities which included a memory map of the train route, blue sky thinking, poetry, bird-making and the building of a drystone wall out of local sayings and recipes from Yorkshire and Lancashire.
Holbeck, Leeds – Thursday 3rd October 2024
Public sessions were held at Slung Low in Holbeck, Leeds. This included working with the Kurdish Communities and local poets and artists, as well as running a closed session with participants from Ripon House, the only female hostel in the Humber and Yorkshire region. Ripon House supports vulnerable women just released from prison. Young children and families worked on bird-making and a collaborative poem about wildlife. The participants from Ripon House also made origami birds, wrote poems on them and also contributed to the drystone wall of local sayings. They then worked with Becky Cherriman and Sarah Hehir to compose a poem with the themes of heritage and wildlife.
Public comments were such as: “Ravia really liked drawing while listening to the sound of water and when you read the story, he tried to make an image in his mind to finish it to make us puzzle over it” mother of Ravia, (aged 6) from the Kurdish community.
On collaborating next year: “It will be really great and we have 91 kids at the Nawroz school in Leeds”.
From the Slung Low Ripon House session, Leeds; “Thank you to you and all your team of wonderful facilitators for making such a wonderfully creative and inspirational session for our visit to Slung Low. Most of the participants have continued to talk about how much they enjoyed it and all really loved going to a new environment and trying a new experience. It was a great bonding opportunity for them. Would love to work with you guys again in the future.”
Bolton-le-Sands Library on Friday 4th October 2024
Friday saw the team head to Bolton-le-Sands library, which was arranged by Culturapedia and Spot On. Verity Healey invited library users to engage with a memory map based on the Bentham Line. Memories included a story about a family turning the two-hour trek from Morecambe to Leeds to see relatives into an epic journey which featured games, rabbit counting at Bentham, egg mayo sandwiches and a huge tea urn, bought specially for the trip. Others told stories of burying dead sheep next to the line, seeing Wild Cats near Settle and laying detonators on the line as part of their job maintaining the route. More Lancashire sayings were added to the wall started in Yorkshire, including “he’s not as green as his cabbage”. Meanwhile Sarah Hehir and Becky Cherriman ran a 90 minute workshop with Year 6 from Bolton-le-Sands CE Primary school, who created their own bird poems on Hen Harrier cut outs to celebrate National Poetry Day.
Culturapedia commented: “It was lovely to see the class of school children attending and experiencing a guided writing session – this was more than I had imagined would be happening but I think they really got something out of the session too. I enjoyed watching the children creating their written piece, but my most favourite activity was talking with people about their Lancashire sayings/phrases and putting them on the stone wall. It opened up a conversation with complete strangers and there were lots of laughs and reminiscing to be had. I think I would make the journey to travel the line to experience the stories. You could market it as if it was a performance.”
A representative from Bolton-le-Sands CoE Primary School: “the children loved their time and felt fully included in the project. They loved the crafts and came back full of enthusiasm. The poetry stood out and it was nice that it was the day after national poetry day.”
On being asked would the school be interested in working with ‘‘outside it is beautiful’’ next year in more regular creative writing workshops working towards a story to go on the audio app to be accessed by communities using the Bentham Line? The answer was simply “Yes.”
Settle Stories Writing Group – Friday 4th October 2024
In the evening ‘outside it is beautiful’ met with local writers from Settle Stories’ writing group for a 90 minute creative writing session online. The focus was on local heritage and wildlife and more contributions were made to the drystone wall.
Settle Stories Writers’ Group organiser commented: “I really enjoyed the meeting on Friday, I know the others did too.”
Morecambe – Saturday 5th October 2024
On Saturday, the team made their way to Morecambe Library where they continued to work with the drystone wall, memory map and bird cut out poems and colouring in for the young children. Old and young members took part, including a young dads and kids’ group who were gathering nearby. In the afternoon the team headed to the Quaker House in Skipton where they learned about the Dock Pudding Championships (and met the Champion!) bees and murder by a Sparrowhawk in the Quaker House Garden and also had a great meeting with the comms officer of the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust and the Peat Partnership.
Bentham: – Monday 7th October 2024
Monday morning’s penultimate workshop was a lovely event with Pioneer Projects at Bentham and people living with dementia and their wellbeing group. Working alongside their facilitators and volunteers, Becky Cherriman and Sarah Hehir led a session which included listening to archive tapes from Bill Mitchell, sensory activities which included painting wildlife and animals on pebbles and culminated with participants reading their own poems inspired by nature to close the session. The Bill Mitchell recordings, which were about cooking food on the train in the days of steam at Hellifield, also inspired one participant to remember family members who had worked on the line.
Pioneer Projects said: “I have had positive feedback about the session. You are very welcome to return next year for the final part of the project and I am sure participants from the group will be willing to contribute to the app.”
The final workshop was an hour-long session with SELFA children aged 11-18 at Bentham Methodist Church in the evening. The session started with a discussion about the different types of animals, including livestock, wildlife and domestic, to be found in the area and ended with group performances of the children acting out their happiest engagements with nature.
Other meetings during the week
As well as running public and closed sessions the team also met with Settle Stories, the Forest of Bowland National Landscape and the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust to discuss creative ways in which they could collaborate together next year on the project: peat restoration; sustainability on the Bentham Line; and The Landmark Trees Project.
The team also met with passengers along the route, and asked them to engage with art provocations on their train journey. Pupils from Lancaster Girls’ Grammar and from The Lancaster Royal Grammar School were particularly responsive and drew some beautiful pictures and /or wrote poetry about what they could see out of the window.
The team also left an activity table at Bentham Station, kindly supported by Gerald Townson and Martin at The Leeds-Morecambe Community Rail Partnership. People passing through were asked to contribute to the drystone wall and post cards of their thoughts and feelings about the Bentham Line, its history and wildlife. The team made many connections in the area, including with local artists and musicians and Leeds Museum and Galleries as well as local wildlife groups.
This phase of the project will end with an audio piece, an adventure, written by Sarah Hehir, which will be based on the Bentham train line route. It will be inspired by all the conversations and heard histories and stories about wildlife around the line and is meant also to serve as an inspiration for the project next year. It will be showcased on Settle Stories’ The Listening Gallery, The Bentham Line website and the ‘outside it is beautiful’ website oiib.org.uk in November.