Bathing Waters on the Waveney

We need your help!

We have a new oral history project, Bathing Waters on the Waveney, starting autumn 2026 and we need your help. 

Ø  We are looking to recruit Oral History Volunteers. This may involved being trained to interview people and collect recordings, helping run the website, researching stories to gather, transcribing interviews etc.

Ø  Do you have a story, memories or photographs to share? Please contact the Project Officer Coral via email: coral@riverwaveneytrust.org or by phone 07561 290523.

Ø  If you would rather speak to a person face-to-face we will be opening our doors for drop-in sessions every Thursday 10am-12pm (excluding school holidays) at the Riverside Centre, Staithe Road, Bungay NR35 1EU. Ring the bell or come on up and ask for Coral.

Ø  Are you a secondary school local to the River Waveney that would like to be involved? Please contact Coral on the email above.

 

Project Aim and Plan

The aim of Bathing Waters on the Waveney is to gather local memories and experiences from adults and older people who have used the river throughout their lives, particularly for recreation and bathing. Additionally we are hoping to gather young people’s aspirations and thoughts on the future of the river.

We are hoping to capture memories by interviewing people and creating sound recordings of their stories, whilst also making copies of photographs to sit alongside these recordings.

We will be engaging with the local community through our Oral History volunteers and we are planning on collaborating with four local secondary schools to enlist the help of students with local knowledge.

 

Sharing Heritage

With these stories and photographs we will create an online archive accessible to all, whilst also collaborating with Suffolk, Norfolk and UEA archives.

 

Free Exhibition

Once we have collected and edited all the stories, the River Waveney Trust will host a free exhibition in autumn/winter 2027 to display to celebrate the work of all involved and share the memories and photographs we have collected. There will also be talks from Project Officers and oral history volunteers. Anyone involved in helping with the project will be invited to join us including students and their families/friends, people who have shared memories and photographs and members of the public who are interested in understanding more about the rich heritage of the River Waveney.

 

How are the schools and students involved, and what can we offer the school throughout this partnership?

 

  1. Whole school assembly

Initially, we would like to conduct a whole school assembly on the history and importance of the River Waveney, an introduction to the Oral History Project, the importance of capturing local heritage and how the students could get involved at home.

 

  1. Questionnaire

We would then give all students a questionnaire to take home, and if they have friends, relatives, neighbours or other people who have memories of using the river Waveney for recreation (swimming, boating, playing etc) they can ask them to fill out this questionnaire and return it to the school and us. We then (in partnership with the school) filter through and select the 30 top opportunities for the most relevant memories.

 

  1. Workshop

These 30 students are then invited to a workshop with us in the school (can be after school or weekend or whenever works for the school/students) to receive training on how to take oral histories and use the equipment.

  1. Oral history interviews

This then leads to the students going away and interviewing their friend or relative and recording the interview in accordance with their training from the workshop. We will also provide a place to upload photos to sit alongside their recording after it has been edited.

 

  1. Other schools and RWT volunteers involved

We will repeat this process with four local schools which there may be some opportunity to collaborate with if this is of interest to all schools involved. At the same time, we will also be completing our own River Waveney Oral History research and interviews with our Oral History Volunteers.

 

  1. Website and Exhibition

All stories, memories and photographs will be edited and uploaded onto the website for all to access. We will then host the final exhibition to celebrate the work of all involved and share the incredible memories we have collected, with students and their families/friends invited to join us.