In January 2025, Yorkshire Cricket Heritage was delighted to announce the launch of the Celebrating Bradford Park Avenue – Oral Histories exhibition.
We have been working hard behind the scenes with some fantastic volunteer transcribers to provide full scripts of our oral history interviewers.
Lead by our project researcher Gemma Bailey, she was able to sit down with 16 participants to interview them on their memories and the ways that their lives have been impacted by the iconic Park Avenue ground.
We are pleased to be able to confirm fantastic progress of the transcription project through hours spent by our fantastic volunteer team across January and February.
We were so pleased to get 15 volunteers involved with our project. We asked a few of them about why they wanted to get involved…
Liz Kay
Which interviews I have worked on:
- Alan Douglas
- Chris Pollard.
Why I wanted to get involved?
I was keen to become involved in the project because it combines my interests in social history and cricket. I appreciate the value of local cricket grounds to communities, and am even old enough to remember Bradford Park Avenue football club!
Sarah Tose
Which interviews I have worked on:
- Dickie Bird
- Nasa Hussain
- Halima Khan
Why I wanted to get involved?
I’m a person who has always loved museums and history and the chance to be involved in a living history project was too good to pass up! I passionately believe that the more visitors hear and see stories from people like themselves, the more engaged they are with what we are doing in museums a the more they enjoy themselves too.
Sophie Wood
Which interviews I have worked on:
- Dickie Bird- Full Interview
- Dickie Bird- Full Interview Extra
- Chris Pollard- Full Interview
- John Helm- Full Interview
I come from a massive Cricket family- it’s something that has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. But no one was more passionate about it than my Grandad- Len Norcliffe. This was the perfect opportunity to combine my love of history with his greatest passion. If he knew I’d listened to a Dickie Bird interview, I think he would have fainted! I’m so happy that I have been able to take part in this project, it has truly been an honor and to do it in the memory of someone just makes it all the more special.
Find out more about our exhibition and listen to the oral history series by clicking below
Bradford Park Avenue Oral History Interviews
