An appeal made by a York theatre for past memorabilia to boost its archive reached as far as South Africa.
Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York’s community-run theatre in Haxby Road, launched the appeal in April to track down and collect the memories and artefacts of past performers, hirers, volunteers and audience members.
The Press ran the appeal at the time, which caught the eye of former Joseph Rowntree Theatre performer Diane Conway.
Diane and her sister Carol Stephenson featured in several Rowntree Youth Club musicals and at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre during the 1960s, including Carol taking the lead as Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz and Annie Oakley in Annie Get Your Gun.
Diane still lives in York, but Carol emigrated to South Africa over 40 years ago.
After reading about the appeal in the Press Diane told her sister about it.
Carol then contacted Graham Mitchell, who is managing the collection of donated items at the theatre, from South Africa to tell him she had items to donate and would bring them with her when she was in York on a family visit.
On Monday (June 12) Carol and Diane made a special trip to visit the theatre and handed over the long treasured items from the time both sisters were performing.
Carol said the theatre was once a “second home” to her and visiting it brough back happy memories.
“Standing in the wings again brought back the thought of me standing shaking in the wings on the first night of Annie Get Your Gun and unable to take the first step on to the stage for my entrance as Annie,” she said.
“Pat Olsen, the stage manager, had to give me a shove but I was fine once I recovered.”
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Graham said he has been amazed at the amount of material collected, all of which has been scanned into a digital record which he will continue to collate before planned exhibitions.
He also hopes to create memory boxes that could be shared with those of past productions.
All items (physical and digital) will be added to the existing archive, which dates back to 1935 and is deposited with the Borthwick Institute at the University of York.
Graham said: “What I have not yet got around to is solving the problem of how to digitize over 120 hours of VHS recordings of over 30 musicals, ballets and plays, a 16 millimetre cine film from 1979 and a reel to reel tape recording of the Saturday Matinee of Rowntree Youth Club’s 1964 production of West Side Story which featured well known stage, film and TV actor David Bradley as one of the gang leaders.
“The issue is not just the time and equipment needed but also making sure we adhere to copyright laws that protect the rights of the writers and composers.”
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