Dinosaur Detectives - The Search for Britain's Last Dinosaurs
A talk by Steve Friedrich on a very special part of Folkestone's fossil heritage...
Back in September 2017, Steve made a major discovery which has helped re-write the story of our past, and confirmed an earlier theory regarding dinosaurs in Britain. Meet the co-discoverer of Britain's last Dinosaurs, and join him on a detective trail discovering how the last dinosaurs to live in Britain were "Tracked Down".
This talk will be accompanied by special access to Steve's own fossils as well as those donated to the Museum by him.
Booking
The talk is £5.00 per person, as with all our talks, they tend to fill up quickly. For further details CLICK HERE to go to our contact form, call 01303 257946 and select option 0 (office hours only) or call into Folkestone Museum & Town Hall to buy your ticket and reserve a seat. If you are a subscriber to the Museum e-newsletter don't forget to quote the discount code at the till!
Refreshments will be available after the talk, donations appreciated
Triumph and Tragedy - Stories from Folkestone Old Cemetery, A Talk
Pioneering Ladies, Folkestone’s answer to ‘Flashman’, an Explorer, a Town Catastrophe, a Reformed Smuggler and a Shipwrecked Lady...
The people that came to stay at Cheriton Road come from far and wide and from all walks of life. But let’s start at the beginning where all the good story’s start. Cheriton Road did not start to come to life until the beginning of 1855, Her Majesty’s Inspector R.D. Grainger Esq. came to Folkestone and suggested that a new cemetery be sited east, north-east or north of the town. In December of 1856 the new burial board instructed the churchwardens that no more burials should take place within the grounds of the town's churches after the 1st September 1857. With this the scene was set for the new (now old) to become not just a place containing people, but also stories, some of which are explored with this talk by members of the Friends of Old Folkestone Cemetery.
About The Friends of Old Folkestone Cemetery
The idea for the ‘Friends’ group originated with Jan Holben, Richard Grundy (Jan’s partner), Peter Anderson (Historian) and Giles Barnard (District Council Community Safety Officer). Noticing how badly some of the graves had been neglected when visiting the old Folkestone cemetery for a Remembrance Ceremony Jan (as Chairman of the District Council at that time), Richard, Peter and Giles discussed what could be done to save this lovely place which tells a unique story of Folkestone – and the idea of ‘Friends of old Folkestone cemetery’ grew from this discussion.
The Friends were formally constituted in July 2016 and since that time have helped to care for the Cemetery and promote its heritage. For more details and how to get involved with their regular Saturday morning working parties CLICK HERE.
Booking
The talk is £5.00 per person, as with all our talks, they tend to fill up quickly. For further details CLICK HERE to go to our contact form, call 01303 257946 and select option 0 (office hours only) or call into Folkestone Museum & Town Hall to buy your ticket and reserve a seat. If you are a subscriber to the Museum e-newsletter don't forget to quote the discount code at the till!
Refreshments will be available after the talk, donations appreciated
Rebuilding Folkestone's Roman Villa - The Folkestone Miniaturist, A Talk
'Rebuilding' Folkestone's Roman Villa in miniature
Folkestone's East Wear Bay Roman Villa was originally excavated in 1924 by Christ's Hospital (Horsham) teacher & noted amateur archaeologist Samuel E. Winbolt, working alongside employees of Folkestone Borough Council. Subsequent digs have taken place, including a rescue dig in 1989, necessitated by coastal erosion and the more recent excavations led by Canterbury Archaeological Trust [CAT] as part of the 'A Town Unearthed' project (2010-2011) and their 2022 autumn dig to assess the villa's condition, the first time its interior had been seen since its post war reburial.
As part of Folkestone Museum's redisplay of its Roman themed display case it commissioned 'The Folkestone Miniaturist' Mike Perry to produce a scale model of the villa in its Roman heyday. Using artefacts from Winbolt's 1924 excavation held in the Museum's collection, conversation with local archaeologists Dr Andrew Richardson and Keith Parfitt MCIfA, FSA and a lot of research in Roman architecture Mike has now produced a scale model, including some of its interior rooms. This talk is about how it all happened and is a chance to see the model up close before it goes in the display case.
About Mike Perry
Also known as ‘The Folkestone Miniaturist,’ Mike's career started with a course in theatre design at the Birmingham College of Art and went on to have a prolific career working on set design for major films, TV shows and theatrical plays. Some of the more well known productions Mike has worked on include The Italian Job’ (1969) and ‘Auf Wiedersehen Pet’ (1983-2004) as well as working for local television company TVS before going freelance and subsequently moving to Folkestone and carving out, quite literally, another career as The Folkestone Miniaturist. To learn more about Mike and his work CLICK HERE to read a Folk Life article about him.
Booking
The talk is £5.00 per person, as with all our talks, they tend to fill up quickly. For further details CLICK HERE to go to our contact form, call 01303 257946 and select option 0 (office hours only) or call into Folkestone Museum & Town Hall to buy your ticket and reserve a seat. If you are a subscriber to the Museum e-newsletter don't forget to quote the discount code at the till!
Refreshments will be available after the talk, donations appreciated
An eighteenth-century entrepreneur: Sarah Baker’s theatre on the Bayle and her other Kentish Theatres, 1737-1816
A talk by Dr Jean Baker, hosted by Folkestone Museum
Dr Jean Baker (not a descendant of Sarah Baker) worked as a journalist for some years. In 2000 she completed a PhD at the University of Kent that explored the significance of provincial theatre in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
"As I sifted through some old papers in the Folkestone Library archives a few years ago, a tattered cutting from an eighteenth-century newspaper fell from the bundle I was about to investigate. In smudgy, hard-to-read print the scrap of paper advertised a week of entertainments that had taken place at ‘the New-Theatre-Folkestone’ in the early spring of 1775.
Among the ‘usual diversions’ on offer were tightrope-walking, comic dancing, musical dramas, operas and pantomimes. Tickets it stated could be bought of a Mrs Sarah Baker at ‘Mr Tart’s upon the Bayle’ and potential patrons were advised to be quick about it as ‘the Company’s stay will be very short’."
This talk will focus on the extraordinary, too-long-forgotten woman behind this announcement, on her Bayle theatre, and on the four ‘great grand’ theatres, as she described them, that she built elsewhere in Kent at the end of the eighteenth century.
The talk is free but, as with all our talks, they tend to fill up quickly. For further details or to reserve a seat CLICK HERE to go to our contact form, call 01303 257946 and select option 0 (office hours only) or call into Folkestone Museum & Town Hall. Refreshments will be available after the talk, donations appreciated.
Writing on the Edge of the Land and Sea
FREE Creative Writing Workshop as part of the Being Human Festival
Coastal landscapes are sites of arrival and departure, innovation, invasion and reinvention, where new thinking is possible and strange forms are washed up by the tide…
Join tutors from Canterbury Christ Church University’s Creative Writing team for an interactive workshop in Folkestone Museum, where we will draw on traditions and innovations in seaside literature to create new writing. Try your hand at cut-up and collage forms; experiment with writing the uncanny; look again at Folkestone’s fascinating past; and be inspired by items in the museum collection.
Workshop materials will be provided. Participants will be given a copy of our Writing on the Edge project pamphlet, with further writing prompts, samples and exercises, to take home.
Spaces are free but limited: advance booking essential and must be booked via Event Bright, click here to go to the booking page
Canterbury Christ Church University are also running a morning walkshop along Folkestone's coast linked to the afternoon workshop, more details click here to go to the walkshop event page
This event is part of the Being Human festival, the UK’s national festival of the humanities, taking place 10–19 November 2022. Led by the School of Advanced Study, University of London, in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the British Academy. For further information please see beinghumanfestival.org.
Roman Canterbury: an update (online talk)
Professor Paul Bennett OBE has recently retired as Director of the Canterbury Archaeological Trust and is a visiting Professor at Canterbury Christ Church University's Centre for Kent History and Heritage.
In this talk, he will present a review and update of Roman Canterbury including excavations that have produced evidence for cemeteries from the second to early fifth century. Readers may recall Paul's part in the re-excavation of Folkestone Roman Villa as part of the 'A Town Unearthed' project which ran in the mid-2010s.
This online talk is presented by our supporter's, the Friends of Folkestone Museum [FoFM]. The talk is free (donations to FoFM gratefully received) but is limited to 100 participants due to ZOOM limits, the talk will stream live at 2pm on Saturday 29th January 2022. To reserve your place and get the ZOOM link please email the Friends at friendsfolkmuseum@gmail.com
Make It! Halloween
Time for a fright whether you're a witch or a wizard!
We'll be making trick or treat baskets and mini-monsters all day, warts and all!
Craft activities are suitable for 4-11 yearold's, younger visitors can also take part but they may need a little help.
There are two sessions, 11am-12.45pm and 1.30pm-3.30pm on both Friday 29th and Saturday 30th October, no booking is necessary but we may restrict numbers, if busy, for everyone's comfort and safety.
For further details email museum@folkestone-tc.gov.uk, ask at the Town Hall Information Desk or call 01303 257946 during normal office hours.
Fossil Roadshow
Dinosaur eggs - its no yolk!
Local fossil expert Steve Friedrich will be joining us during half-term with his amazing fossils.
If you've a budding young paleontologist in the house Folkestone Museum is the place to head to on Wednesday 27th and Thursday 28th October.
No booking is necessary although if it gets uncomfortably busy we may limit numbers so that everyone feels safe.
For further details email museum@folkestone-tc.gov.uk, ask at the Town Hall Information Desk or call 01303 257946 during normal office hours.
Eanswythe and the Anglo-Saxons
Folkestone Museum and St Mary’s & St Eanswythe’s Church jointly present ‘Eanswythe and the Anglo-Saxons’ on the 11th & 12th September.
This weekend, which we hope to become an annual event, is a celebration of Folkestone’s Anglo-Saxon (410-1066AD) heritage, including its patron Saint St Eanswythe. The event is timed to coincide with St Eanswythe’s feast day, which falls on the 12th September every year. St Eanswythe is one of England’s earliest indigenous saints, a member of the Kentish Royal Dynasty, who helped introduce Christianity into the country by welcoming the Augustinian mission in the 5th Century. Eanswythe herself, born some forty years later was to figure in the establishment of Folkestone’ Anglo-Saxon minster and her remains, exceptionally, have stayed in the church dedicated to her, surviving Henry VIII’s Reformation and the break from the Roman Catholic Church in the 1530s.
Saturday 12th September
This is the focus for the historical aspects of the event, which will take place in both the Museum and St Mary’s & St Eanswythe’s Church. The locations and times are as follows (subject to availability):
11.00 (Church) Welcome by Father John Walker
From 11.00 (Museum) Anglo-Saxon storytelling and craft activities
11.15 (Church) Coffee and cake
11.30 (Church) Father John Walker – ‘St Eanswythe’s meditation practices’
12.15 (Church) Craft stalls
Re-enactment by local groups taking place through the day in and around the Museum and Church
15.00 (Museum) Dr Andrew Richardson - ‘St Eanswythe and Kentish Royal Burials’*
19:00 (Church) Lunatraktors (click to follow link) ‘broken folk’ concert**
*This is a pay to enter lecture with tickets a £5.00 per person, please go to the Folkestone Museum Billetto webpage (click to follow link)
**The Lunatrakors concert is free but donations will be gratefully accepted
Sunday 12th September – St Eanswythe’s Day
A solemn Eucharist for St Eanswythe Day followed by coffee, wine and cake, given by Father John Walker in St Mary’s & St Eanswythe’s Church at 10.30am
This webpage will be kept up-to-date with any changes to the programme. For any other details please enquire at Folkestone Town Hall, St Mary’s & St Eanswythe’s Church or call 01303 257946.
Talk: Eanswythe Found
Eanswyth Found? Is a talk by Dr Andrew Richardson FSA of Canterbury Archaeological Trust - a specialist in the archaeology of the kingdom of Kent. Andrew wrote the method statement that helped secure the Faculty and is project managing the analysis of the relics for the Finding Eanswythe project.
Andrew is a specialist on metal small finds of all periods, he has considerable experience and a passion for community archaeology and in engaging people with the past and was a key figure in the excavations on the Roman villa at East Wear Bay ‘A Town Unearthed’.
Tickets are £5 per person, please click here to book