A MAN is going back in time to live like a 14th Century peasant farmer for a week to launch a £10,000 fundraising appeal.

Andrew Baird is giving up his home comforts to spend a week living in a thatched crofter's cottage at Ryedale Folk Museum, in Hutton-le-Hole, North Yorkshire.

He is a member of nearby Pickering's First Responder team, who are trained to respond to emergencies prior to the arrival of an ambulance.

The First Responders want to buy a marked emergency vehicle to help them negotiate traffic and need to raise £10,000.

Mr Baird, 55, from Marshall Drive, Pickering, is a volunteer at the museum and decided to make use of its facilities to help raise the cash.

He said: "We have been called out more than 25 times since the scheme was launched on May 13, mostly to people with chest pains.

"During the Pickering rush-hour and holiday traffic queues, it is impossible for an unmarked car to make much headway.

"If we had a marked car, we feel people would be more inclined to give way to us and therefore improve our response time to the patient.

"I am a volunteer at the museum and I have often wondered what it would be like to live in one of the houses, and that's where the idea came from."

The crofter's cottage represents a typical dwelling of the medieval period. It has no internal partitions and would have housed a family and their livestock.

Mr Baird will live as authentically as possible, wearing traditional dress and eating meat stews and vegetables.

He is planning to spend his time demonstrating a poll lathe, a typical 14th Century method for wood turning and working in the medieval garden.

On Thursday, August 19, and Sunday, August 22, visitors will be encouraged to pay to throw rotten tomatoes at him in the stocks.

"I am looking forward to it," he said. "It will certainly be interesting. I am hoping to raise about £500, which would really help to kick-start the appeal."

Anyone who would like to sponsor him can contact him on (01751) 477525.