Down Memory Lane

Croydon Jubilee Church works with many elderly people on Monk’s Hill and the surrounding housing areas. As we have chatted with our elderly community at lunch club and whilst taking them away on our annual holiday, we’ve been impressed with their wonderful stories of days gone by and their memories of childhood and earlier generations. Without doubt, those who are now in their 80’s and 90’s have lived through some amazing times. To this end, we have begun a project to record their memories and stories to produce a DVD for each person. Primarily we want this to be a blessing to the families of each of our elderly friends and to help the person to feel a sense of peace about recording their thoughts and memories and passing them on. The family will have these memories preserved and will be able to keep them for future generations. Moreover, we will keep some of these memories, where appropriate, in a central archive for the history of the community and anyone wanting information for years to come.

 

Our elderly community are a wonderful resource for future generations. They are people who deserve our time and attention and are often the forgotten generation. We are attempting to give them time and our team’s expertise so that they can know that they are valued and their memories are precious. As part of the process, we involve local teenagers in the process of interviewing, recording editing and producing the DVD. We’re hopeful that this will improve young peoples’ attitudes towards the elderly and reduce some of the fear that elderly people may have of teenagers.