Beeston + District Civic Society launches campaign to have historical local women recognised.
Walk around the area covered by the Society and you’ll notice it has a very healthy population of blue plaques: 35 to be precise. These immediately recognisable, blue circles were installed by the South Broxtowe Blue Plaques scheme to commemorate eminent locals and events. But not a single one of these plaques is for a woman.
As part of our 50th Anniversary celebrations and this International Women’s Day we’re launching a campaign, called Lady Plaques, seeking to celebrate historical local women, with plaques of their own. Red ones.
Public nominations are now being accepted – they’re essential to the work of any plaque scheme, and in this case even more so. Owing to poor documentation of women's lives throughout history, with evidence and records scarcer and harder to find, the help of local historians, volunteers, and local residents’ shared stories will be crucial to the success of the scheme, and vital to the search for women who lived, worked and quietly achieved things in the area. Tamar, trustee and campaign leader explains,
“History is famously written by the victors, and unfortunately for us they’re pretty much always men. Women in local history are rarely highlighted; often combined into one homogenous section such as “Women in History” with barely a paragraph each. Sometimes, they have no name at all or are merely referred to as “so-and-so’s wife”.’
She adds, “Historically, women in our society were permitted to do little in terms of achievement beyond the doorstep or the nursery, so it’s quite a task to find women in the archives. But the Civic Society knows there were smart, brave, exceptional women in our area – and many women whose stories form the fabric of our community history for other reasons. We want to write them in to history. But we need help!”
We already have a handful of potential candidates, including pioneers in health, social welfare, and humanitarian causes. But if there’s a historical woman from Beeston, Chilwell, Attenborough, Bramcote or Toton who you think deserves a plaque, we want to hear from you.
A volunteer panel will then convene annually to consider the nominations.
Full details, eligibility criteria, and a nomination form are on our website. If you would like to help support the project in other ways, such as sponsorship, research, fundraising or being on the panel, you can get in touch directly with the campaign by email, social media or via the website: https://beestoncivicsociety.org.uk/ladyplaques/.