What the heck is a lek?
Males great bustards perform spectacular courtship displays, gathering at a ‘lek’ or small display ground to try to impress the females.
Wiltshire Museum’s ‘Letters Home’ project used micro-volunteering* to engage a wide range of new audiences. Twenty-nine volunteers wrote fictional letters home from local men who died in action in WW1. The letters generated overwhelmingly positive feedback from the community.
* Micro-volunteering is when volunteers complete small tasks that make up a larger project. They are ideal for people who don’t have much time, and can’t make long-term commitments.
Home » Our work » Highlights » Reaching new audiences through micro-volunteering
The project was part of the museum’s exhibition ‘Wiltshire Remembers: Aftermath of the First World War’, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, and a larger commemoration within Devizes for the 100th anniversary of the end of WW1.
Rachael Holtom, Development Officer at Wiltshire Museum, explains how the project was run and the benefits for the museum and community.
“Words are cheap but they can create priceless museum outreach!”
Rachael Holtom
“It brought home to me the utter futility of war, when they tried to send a man in poor health for basic training and he died before setting foot on foreign soil as a result.”
Roz, micro-volunteer
William Herbert Bambridge, WW1 soldier
“I felt quite moved by my involvement with the project – my boy being only 15 when he joined up really touched me. I tried to get the feelings of that half boy, half man in the letter and found it quite a challenge to make it believable.”
Rosaleen, micro-volunteer
We also involved a diverse range of volunteers, many of whom hadn’t been involved with the museum before:
Window box created during Letters Home project
WW1 commemoration project in Devizes
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Males great bustards perform spectacular courtship displays, gathering at a ‘lek’ or small display ground to try to impress the females.
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