AN AMBITIOUS oral history project to document life in Cashes Green is to start in spring.

The study, entitled Cashes Green on the Map, aims to gather residents’ past and present experiences of local people and places.

Organisers are seeking volunteers to share their memories or artefacts and help create an exhibition of all the findings.

Project manager Sally May said: "Cashes Green is an under-represented area and hopefully this will put it on the map and help people to understand more of their own heritage.

"These older people are dying out and we’re in danger of never knowing what Cashes Green used to look like."

Sally May, a parish councillor for Cashes Green, came up with the idea of an oral history project after moving to the area from Brighton three years ago.

Meanwhile artist Lis Paker also decided to do a similar project after working as a youth worker in the Cashes Green Youth and Social Centre in the late 1980s.

The pair joined forces last November and received support for research from the adult education department of Gloucestershire County Council.

"An oral history is a way of getting people to talk to each other a bit more," said Lis, who is the project’s initiator and artist.

"You can perhaps get young people listening to old people and vice-versa."

A survey will take place of about 250 householders in Cashes Green during January asking if they have any memories or artefacts to share and whether they would like to help create the exhibition.

Organisers not only want people’s experiences of buildings such as Cashes Green Hospital but also of everyday life.

"There used to be a butcher’s shop here and we used to go dancing behind the youth club," said Lis, who has lived in Cashes Green for 20 years.

"We want to know people’s memories of what it looked like in the past, what people engaged in and how we interacted with each other."

Volunteers will help create an exhibition with various materials and tools, ranging from paper and pen to video cameras and tape recorders.

The exhibition will be held in the Museum in the Park next year.

Anyone interested in taking part can contact Lis on 07754 059768 or astrolis@btinternet.com