Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

Walking Encyclopaedia of Harringay's WWI History

Bethany Burrows- Atherton, Organist at St Paul's Harringay and local historian - pictured with Harringay's "dodgy WWI medal" and an album of pictures of local boys who went off to fight

One of my reasons for visiting St Paul's church today was to catch up with what Bethany has been digging up about our local WWI history.

From reading her posts on HoL, I was aware that Bethany has been researching our local war history, but what I hadn't appreciated was quite how much she's done.

Bethany has pulled together a huge amount of knowledge and a good collection of war-related Harringay items, borrowing from museums and collectors she's approached.

Today, as she leafed through an album containing pictures of Harringay boys who went off to fight, if I pointed out any particular picture, in just about every case Bethany had a story to tell about that person. Her knowledge in this area is phenomenal.

I wondered aloud with her how that deep and broad knowledge might best be brought to a wider local audience. I mused over some sort of video, but wondered what other ideas/offers people might have. It seems a shame for this trove of nuggets to go undiscovered. Any ideas?

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Permalink Reply by Bethany Burrow Atherton on November 9, 2014 at 19:49

Aw, thanks Hugh. There's loads and loads more stuff I've found out than we could cover in the exhibition, and I'd definitely be open to ideas as to how we could make sure it gets shared - there's no point in it just sitting in my brain (and several spreadsheets!) forevermore.

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Permalink Reply by Paul on November 9, 2014 at 21:02

Hi Bethany We have organised a number of walks locally including a WW1 in Crouch End. We'd like to do something similar in Haringey. Perhaps we could talk to you about how to incorporate your ideas and give them a wider audience. Paul.

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on November 10, 2014 at 1:21

Do you mean Harringay or Haringey, Paul?

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Permalink Reply by Bethany Burrow Atherton on November 11, 2014 at 15:35

Hi Paul - this sounds like a good idea. I have your e-mail address from having been on one of your walks, so I'll drop you a line a bit later and we'll see how we can collaborate.