My name is Ethanual Crabtree, and I am a Graduate Trainee Librarian at Lynfield Mount Hospital in Bradford, West Yorkshire. My role in the library includes many responsibilities such as being on the front counter desk, being first point of call for staff on site, supporting the librarians, and being involved in the development of the Health Promotion resources. I am here on a 1-year training role to develop myself and gain the skills needed to be able to then go onto to apply for librarian roles.
Whilst being halfway through my role at the minute I have thoroughly enjoyed the work with Carl Challinor and the Health Promotion collection. Carl Challinor is the librarian who oversees the running of the Health Promotion resources. This involves working with library users, collaborating with organisations and vital work to support staff around the trust in their roles. Carl and I have a similar interest in music, and this became a topic of discussion around some of the Health Promotion resources.
Within the collection there is a reminiscence section which is frequently used for older peoples’ services. This is looking to be updated currently as the generation of people changes and what they knew in their younger life is different. This can be from childhood to adult age with examples such as toys, tv shows, music and even household items. Carl and I sat down and discussed what could be relevant to the North of England as well as something being a middle ground for age groups. Through many sidetracks we came out with Northern Soul!
Northern Soul… what does it mean? Whether it be pride in being northern or about the spirit of the North of England. In some ways it can mean that but also it was the name attached to a very beautiful youth movement that occurred in the 1970’s. It is known as the ‘child’ of the 1960’s mod movement due to the music widely associated with the movement. The Northern Soul movement came at time when Britain felt an overcast from the previous decade of the 1960’s. Young people wanted something different than glam rock and the pop music of the time. Northern Soul was all about rarity and who had the next best record. The music was heavily based around rare soul records that did not get much airplay or recognition in the mid 1960’s. The fashion of the movement and the dancing was very influenced by the African American artists too. The reason it also got its name Northern Soul was that it was based heavily in the North of England in places such as Wigan, Blackpool and Stoke. Furthermore, little segments would branch off in other towns such as Bradford, Halifax and Burnley.
In light of our discussions, we decided to create a resource all around the movement and bring it to life as much as we could. We recently went to an event that used bingo as an icebreaker and made us want to incorporate that. This led to us creating a version of Northern Soul bingo. We also wanted some visual resources. I found these through watching documentaries and scouring Google images and looking at fan sites. It is a real pleasure to give the movement another voice and, being a fan of the music myself, hope it can go onto provide some joy!You can browse the resources on our catalogue here: https://yorcat.koha-ptfs.co.uk/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumber=77093
And if you wanted to learn more about our Northern Soul resource please get in touch: ethanual.crabtree@bdct.nhs.uk
Ethanual Crabtree
Graduate Trainee Librarian
Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust
