Community News & Events

	Swannington Heritage Trust
	Update for January/February 2006
	Find out more about horse gin winding engines....
	Update for February/March 2006

The landscapes in which the Swannington Heritage Trust works provide evidence of centuries of coal mining activity in Leicestershire. To bring this heritage to life the Trust recently constructed a Horse Gin on their Gorse Field site.

Most of the coal raised from coal mining on sites such as The Gorse Field, Swannington, would have been taken by coal higglers on their packhorses to markets as far as forty miles away. Later with the development of animal powered winding engines many horses were being used to raise coal from greater depths. To demonstrate the important relationship between man and horse in the coal mining industry, the Trust contacted LANDshapes with an exciting proposal to build and install a new piece of sculpture on their site.

Trevor Cooper & Phil Eames of Sculptura

Skilled metal sculptors Phil Eames and Trevor Cooper of Sculptura, based at Moira Furnace, were the ideal team to set the project on its way. The go ahead to build the horse was subject to the Trust securing planning permission form North West Leicestershire District Council, which resulted in a 3 month process.

We pick up the story in February with Denis Baker, Chairman of the group …

Now that the site where the sculpture is to be sited has been identified, the sparks are flying in the Sculptura Workshop! Members of the Trust have been to visit their industrious enterprise to see the horse coming to life!

Vital stats:

Almost complete!

The horse began life as a cardboard pattern…but he is now constructed in 1.2m steel, mig welded together as the steel is moulded into shape. When finished we will need a few people to manoeuvre him!
We estimate that our horse is built from 18 square metres of steel.
Construction time is an estimated 4 weeks for the horse and man.

Trevor and the horse

What do Phil and Trevor think? The Sculptura team are clearly enjoying building the horse, which is their first public art commission in The National Forest. He is beginning to take shape: he looks alive, weighty and solid: the kids will love him!

What has been the most difficult part? Definitely getting life-like features and shape to the legs and head!

The finished horse - a real 'home made' landscape feature which will delight locals and tourists alike for years to come

We have reached a busy period in the Swannington Heritage Trust volunteer’s calendar, pioneering many local events and working with other community groups:

• The group has been carrying out work on the Gorse Field to improve the area of ancient grassland by removal of shrubs and briars. Volunteers from other community groups, including the Marlene Reid Centre and the local Scout groups are invited to join our weekly, practical, landscape management working parties. A larger working party meets once a month on one of our four sites. A weekly working party operates at Hough Mill on every Friday morning. Volunteers are welcome to join. • Work has also been progressing at the adjacent Hough Windmill to make improvements to our visitor attraction by building a skeleton working model of the mill, enabling visitors to understand the mechanism better. • We have also produced a new advertising leaflet for the coming season to inform the public of the Trust’s aims and activities. • Local History Groups to visit the Gorse Field and Mill. We had visits from the Newcomen Society and from the A.I.A, no doubt triggered by our winning of the National Dorothea Award for Restoration.	• Being active members of the Leicestershire Museums Forum we take on a range of roles. In 2005 we were successful in winning, once again, the Forum’s Leicestershire County Council Heritage Award and we are planning to host the Forum’s AGM this year. • We are liaising with teachers, through EMMLAC, in a pilot scheme to produce teaching materials for local school study groups based on our resources and archive, and we visit local History Groups and schools to talk about the development of the mining landscape and village community. Our programme for 2006 is, at the moment, being planned and group visits will be welcome. • Monthly meetings. We hold a monthly meeting at the village’s Fountain Inn for Friends of the Trust to discuss issues relating to our work.
Would you like to join Swannington Heritage Trust in their activities?
Our website www.swannington-heritage.co.uk is kept reasonably up to date and attracts a commendable number of hits. We have produced our own leaflet to help recruit new members to the group and to work around a key problem we encounter: commercial producers of tourism leaflets make no recognition of the fact that we do not charge for visits to any of our sites, preferring to receive donations from satisfied visitors.
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Community News & Events

Swannington Heritage Trust

Update for January/February 2006

Trevor Cooper & Phil Eames of Sculptura

Almost complete!

Trevor and the horse

The finished horse - a real 'home made' landscape feature which will delight locals and tourists alike for years to come