Nationwide Building Society has teamed up with the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to launch the Nationwide Community and Heritage Awards 2008, inviting the public to nominate people or groups who deserve recognition for community or voluntary work that has made a real difference to people’s lives. Nominations for the very best and most inspirational volunteers in the UK can be made from today, for either:

Community Champion – recognition for those who have made an impact in their local community.
Heritage Hero – recognition for those who have volunteered to become involved in saving a part of their heritage and sharing it with others.

For me visit this link. Thanks to Pete Millington.

June 19th sees 2008 sees Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter Discovery Centre host the Paradise Preserved? West Midlands Cemeteries, a conference organised by the Garden History Society in association with Birmingham’s Victorian Society…

“There will be talks on the history of 19th Century cemeteries with particular reference to West Midland examples, the present state and conservation of cemeteries, English Heritage and historic cemeteries and a vision for them. We shall visit Key Hill and Warstone Lane Cemeteries in the afternoon with an optional tour in the evening of London Road Cemetery, Coventry, designed by Paxton. Speakers include Ian Hussein, Jonathan Lovie, Sarah Rutherford, Jenifer White and Birmingham City Council Conservation Officer, Toni Demidowicz.”

For more information try this link and thanks to D’log for spotting this.

The US Library of Congress knows how to share. It is steadily adding hundreds of extraordinary photos to its bit (link)the picture sharing website flickr. They are using the site because i allows the public to add to the significance of the pictures. We can use keywords to describe them, add extra details or information about the people or places in the comments and even use google maps and other website to mark where the photo was taken. It is such a simple idea. So, does Birmingham have a photostash which ought to be seen and catalogued by crowd? Hat tip Peter Bradwell at Demos.

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