Salford museum helps Belong Atherton residents take a trip down memory lane

More than a dozen people from Belong Atherton took a trip down memory lane as they went on a visit to Salford Museum’s Lark Hill Place.
Fourteen customers were accompanied by members of staff from the village for a tour around the recreated, Victorian era, northern street, which was created in 1957 when many of central Salford’s shops and houses were being demolished.
The visitors got to relive and share some of their own experiences, with the cobbled streets and authentic shop fronts bringing back an array of memories from their own lives.
The Lark Hill tour proved a hit with visitors, who said they enjoyed walking around the old style shops, which included music and toy shops, a pub, and an old fashioned corner shop selling food, household items and sweets.
“Everyone really enjoyed it,” said Atherton’s experience co-ordinator Gemma Willetts, who organised the trip.
“It was good because it allowed the group to interact with each other, comparing the shops they were seeing to the shops they used to go into, and comparing the types of sweets people used to buy and that kind of thing. It brought back a lot of memories for some of the group.”
Gemma added: “Some of the shop fronts are the originals from the 1950s so they included shops that some of the group remembered, it brought back memories of the pubs they would go to and one resident said he remembered running down cobble streets and sparks coming off the bottom of his shoes.”
The trip was organised as part of a wider project within the Atherton village to enable people from inside and outside the village, including those with dementia, to come together and share memories.
Village staff have been working with residents on creating their own memory boxes, an idea that was introduced after using similar boxes loaned from Salford museum.
The themed boxes are used to store items and keepsakes and are a useful tool for those with dementia, helping them to recall fond memories from their life or inspire conversations with other people, which can also inspire feelings and memories.
Gemma said they were already being used in activities in the village and had also proved popular with residents from the surrounding area. She added: “They’re not just aimed at people with dementia so we have had lots of people from our homes and apartments mixing with people who have come in from the community to join in the sessions and they have all been able to interact with each other and share their memories.
“Our activities are about bringing everyone together from inside and outside the village, remembering and reminiscing together, and those with dementia are able to join in, making the activity beneficial to all of our customers.”