The East Lancashire Community Rail Partnership (ELCRP) are pleased to be able to announce that they have been successful in a bid for a grant from the Community Rail Development Fund, the first in this financial year.
The grant is to help fund a project designed to support the return to rail through the development of a leisure and active travel promotion based on the inter-urban Todmorden Curve service between Manchester and Blackburn and the Preston to Colne local service.
The project will see a short animated film created to illustrate the life of Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth, who is one of the women featured in the booklet ‘Amazing Women by Rail’ (see https://communityraillancashire.co.uk/amazing-women/ – Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth is featured on page 34).
The creation of the animation will involve a year 6 class at Padiham Green CofE Primary School who will work with a local artist Cath Ford and Huckleberry Films to produce artwork about the life and work of Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth to feature in the animation. Padiham is close to Rose Grove and Burnley Manchester Rd stations both of which are on the Todmorden Curve service as well as Burnley Barracks and Central on the Colne line. The Burnley stations and Rose Grove are close to the Padiham Greenway which has been constructed on the former Great Harwood loop line and is now a walking and cycling route to/from Padiham.
The animation will include images of textiles from The Gawthorpe Textiles Collection which is housed at Gawthorpe Hall, Padiham, the former home of Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth and open to visitors.
The animation will support leisure use of the Todmorden Curve service and will be used to promote days out to Gawthorpe Hall/Padiham encouraging use of the Padiham Greenway, which is accessible from Burnley (Manchester Road, Central and Barracks) and Rose Grove stations. This will link in with CRL’s and the ELCRP’s other promotions of the Todmorden Curve service.
The year 6 pupils will also be taken on an escorted rail trip to CRL’s education base at Accrington to learn more about the role of the local railway in supporting the textile industry and rail safety.
The team at Huckleberry Films says “We are absolutely delighted to have received funding to develop an animated short film highlighting Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth and her important legacy. Rachel lived at Gawthorpe Hall, and during her lifetime collected thousands of textile items which have become the basis for the textile collection held there now. She was also one of the founding members of the Girl Guide movement, and we’re really looking forward to discovering more about her interesting and inspiring life so we can share it through our film. Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth was an amazing woman and her impact can still be seen and felt today.”
“We’ll be working with local artist Cath Ford, Padiham Green Primary School and the team from the Gawthorpe Textiles Collection to develop assets for the film and are looking forward to getting started.”
Richard Watts, Chair of Community Rail Lancashire said: “This is great news and is part of CRL’s and the East Lancashire CRP’s plans to complement the rail industries’ plans to recover from the impact of the Coronavirus pandemic. The project is focused around the Todmorden Curve service, the Padiham Greenway, a local primary school, Gawthorpe Hall and Rachel Kay-Shuttleworth who features in the ‘Amazing Women by Rail’ booklet. This is a leisure based project but through the involvement of the Padiham Green cofE primary school also achieves one of CRL’s key objectives of ‘educating the passengers of the future’.