Beamish is one of our most filmed at locations with Fred Dibnah.  It’s a great place for a family day out where you can have fun whilst learning about our industrial, agricultural and social history.  Each area of the musuem tells the story of Georgian, Victorian or Edwardian living.  You can see how life in the North East changed over a 100 years from a Georgian agricultural lifestyle to the hustle and bustle of the Industrial Revolution.

We were always shown great hospitality on our filming visits, in particular from Jacki Winstanley in the setting up of the filming.  It was great to be able to turn up at the location and know that we were going to be able to shoot some great stuff.  Fred loved the place because it felt real and all the people working there really knew what they were talking about.  On site nothing was too much trouble for the team -  many of whom are volunteers.

We first went to Beamish in 2000 for Fred Dibnah’s Magnificent Monuments, then followed shortly afterwards for Fred Dibnah’s Victorian Heroes, Fred Dibnah’s Age of Steam and finally for Fred Dibnah’s World of Steam, Steel and Stone.  (All of which are available from our shop: http://theviewfromthenorth.co.uk/shop/.)

This half term Beamish are commemorating the 1890 Silksworth Colliery Strike and subsequent evacuations of the workers and their families by owner Lord Londonderry.  You can get involved in reenactments and soak up the community spirit as the Pit Village, Colliery, Town and Tramway come together to remember those evicted miners.

The Silksworth community protested and aside from one incident dubbed ‘Charge of the Cops Brigade’ it was a peaceful – if not rather noisy protest.  Which seems amazing by today’s standards to say whole families were being turfed out of their homes!

There’s loads of stuff going on as part of the anniversary commemorations including reenactments of the evictions, Rosette making to show your support to the miners, the Printer producing flyers and posters, the fantastic Beamish trams and a special exhibition by 2 Silksworth Heritage groups documenting the mining history of the area.  And if that’ not enough as an extra bonus it’s half price entry for the whole of the half term week!  Can’t say fairer than that.   For more details see the Beamish website at http://www.beamish.org.uk/