PEOPLE are being asked to share their memories of life in Shildon via a live link with the towns new railway museum.

Five venues have been chosen to link up with Locomotion: the National Railway Museum using software that will help residents record their memories.

People who worked at the former Shildon Shops, or who have lived in the town for many years, are being asked to call at one of the centres to permanently record the past through the Time Watch Scheme.

Shildon Town Library, the Community Learning Centre at Sunnydale School, the Soho Street Sunday School rooms and the Jubilee Fields Community Centre have been provided with software that will link them to a computer at the museum.

Kathryn Furness, community network and education officer at Sedgefield Borough Council, said that the authority had purchased the software to get people more involved with the museum.

She said: "It is a project that we have developed to get the local community involved in the scheme.

"It is an informal way of researching Shildon and it is the history of the people and what they want to record."

Yesterday, Shildon historian Alan Ellwood visited Shildon Town Library to show residents what the Time Watch Scheme was about and how they could use it.

He said: "This is about getting the people of Shildon to share their memories. People are very wary of computers but this is very, very simple to use.

"People can scan old photos in and write things down or record their memories.

"We need to get as much as we can into the system. Memories are important and they die when people die.''

Mr Ellwood will visit the Jubilee Fields Community Centre tomorrow, between 1pm and 3pm, for a demonstration about the software.

Published: 26/07/2004