Phil

And anyone interested in Chat Whit. We ran this story
earlier this year. It was also in Down To Earth, BTW.

Cheers

Jeremy
(Editor, Congleton Chronicle)


>From 28th January

The first step on the road to the new future of 
Chatterley Whitfield, said by English Heritage to be 
England's most important historic colliery, began on 
Friday with a £120,000 programme of emergency re
pairs for buildings at risk.
The Chatterley Whitfield Partnership, formed last 
June between English Heritage and Stoke-on-Trent 
City Council, has commissioned the first work on a 
multi-million pound project to bring life back to the 
colliery's 34 scheduled ancient monuments and listed 
buildings. 
Other members of the partnership are Joan Walley, 
M.P. for Stoke North, and the Government Office for 
the West Midlands.
Sir Jocelyn Stevens, chairman of English Heritage, 
said: "The work that began on site today is the first 
step in our plan to develop Chatterley Whitfield from 
its present decay into a major asset for the 
community." 
More than £2 million has been pledged to the 
regeneration of Chatterley Whitfield; £1.3 million of 
this comes from English Heritage, £463,500 from the 
Heritage Lottery Fund, £254,400 from Stoke-on-Trent 
City Council and £110,000 from Advantage West 
Midlands.
The repairs are being undertaken by the contract 
services department of Stoke-on-Trent City Council 
and will continue over the next three months. They 
include: 
* removing vegetation from all buildings; 
* securing or removing loose and dangerous roofing 
on all buildings; 
* mending gutters, down-pipes, drains and windows 
on the Hesketh building, the pithead baths, canteen, 
medical centre, rescue station, main offices, old 
power house, old electrical sub-station, fitters shops, 
area shaft building, weighbridge and weighplate; 
repairing the old offices for use by those working on 
the Chatterley Whitfield Project; inspecting and 
making safe site electricity; repairing the fencing 
around the site and demolishing temporary buildings.
Also on site were the television historian Dan 
Cruickshank and a team from BBC2 who are filming 
a feature on Chatterley Whitfield for a new series of 
One Foot in the Past to be broadcast in April.
The former coalmine became well known as a 
heritage museum and won awards for its exhibition 
and the opportunity for visitors to travel under
ground. But this all came to and when the museum 
went into receivership. Much of the former contents 
were later sold off.


END 


%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%