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Cambridgeshire Archives holds many historical documents relating to the people and communities of the Fens. Here archives assistant Debra Lyons talks about some of the historical records we have and about how you can see the originals.

This is our first video, so all comments and suggestions are very welcome!

Are you up for a sporty challenge before the Olympic torch reaches Cambridgeshire?

The Yes you CAN recycling relay will be making its way through the county between 24-28 May 2012.

You will be able to sign up to enter the relay until 6th of May. Get ready to show us your mettle and help telling the true story about recycling metals.

Ever wondered if you can recycle aerosol cans, biscuit tins or pet food tins? Yes, you CAN! They will have a chance of becoming anything from a new can to a part of a car.

Volunteers from all walks of life will be passing the aerosol can baton across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough using whatever sport or muscle-powered means of motion they fancy.

You can take part alone, with your family, with a sport club or your community group. Get creative! In our relay you can sprint, cycle, skate, do a three-legged run, horse ride or paddle along a river – so long as you are able to cover safely a reasonable distance of our route shown below and pass the can to the next challenger.

You can even use the relay as an opportunity to fund raise for your local charity or community organisation!

Visit www.recap.co.uk/yesyoucan for more information.

On Easter Sunday we went to Wansford and then to Orton Mere to see ‘Tornado’ on the Nene Valley Railway. 60163 ‘Tornado’ is a new 4-6-2 A1 Pacific locomotive built by the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust and first moved under its own steam in 2008. The video starts at Wansford where the train, pulled by ‘Tornado’ arrived and the single line working token is seen before it was handed to the signalman, off camera. The rest of the video is taken at Orton Mere Station where ‘Tornado’ running tender first arrived from Wansford. Later the locomotive pulled the train back from Peterborough and then continued back to Wansford. Sadly the video has not got smellyvision, there is nothing quite like the smell of a steam engine.

Last Friday I popped over to Cromwell Community College with Matt Hall and fellow SYP contributors Bill and Sheridan to meet with some archaeologists from Oxford Archaeology East (who are actually based at Bar Hill) We were very fortunate to be able to see how they go about their work and Stephen Macauley and Rob Atkins very kindly allowed me to film them talking to Bill.
Sheridan has also written this rather wonderful blog:
The silver lining of development is that there has to be archaeological work beforehand. The investigative trenching on Tithe showed that there were probable Bronze Age settlements. The secondary school’s privately owned plot, which abuts Tithe, is being turned into an all weather pitch, trenches were dug and lo! They have hit what looks like an Iron Age setlement. Iron Age settlements in the Fens are a much rarer breed of post hole. Until 1978, and the Fenland Archaeological Survey, it was more or less believed that Iron Age settlers hadn’t made it to the Fens. The water level in the Fens was at it’s highest in the Iron age and hence the modern fen-edge essentially marks the lower limits of Iron Age settlement (c. 700BC-50AD). Chatteris has already been noted as being fairly replete with pre-historic archaeology, having yielded some 13,000 Iron Age artefacts from a substantial prior digs at Langwood Fen and Stonea Camp, which also threw up Roman habitation finds, suggesting continuous habitation. ( a quick search of the Heritage Gateway will show you what they found). This latest find can only add to the information on the area. Iron Age peoples came AFTER the Bronze Age blokes mentioned a lot at the Must Farm site, and were in all likelihood different peoples from different areas. I’m not up on the latest methodology, but it used to be thought that the Iron Age people of Fenland were a “Third Wave” of immigrants of Celtic and Germanic stock, responding to overcrowding of their territories by expanding, upwards towards Peterborough, at around 50AD. A lot of the Iron Age finds in this part of Fenland are from that later period, merging with Early Roman. But this site seems to be an Early Iron Age site, and so it’s that bit rarer. Whether it marries up with the previous finds, I don’t know. Either way, it’s a joy for me to know that my back garden field now has a recognised Iron Age settlement on the edge of it, even though it will shortly be a playing pitch.

If you’re aged 50 or over and have an interest in the unique traditions and customs of the fens then you won’t want to miss next Monday’s Engage talk in Chatteris library.

Gordon Phillips, dancer, teacher, story-teller and moving spirit behind the revival of the Ramsey Straw Bear will tell how the Fenland farm hands of yesterday used to lighten the dark days of winter with dancing and revelry on Plough Monday and how the same custom is being celebrated in the 21st century.

When? On Monday 2nd April at 2pm
Where? In the Vermuyden Room at Chatteris Library
How much will it cost? Engage talks are usually FREE.