Come and join us if you dig it!

It will be based primarily on the remains of Thornhill Hall on the island in the park but will also include a survey of the rest of the park to try and identify its development over the last few hundred years.

A professional community archaeologist has been appointed to conduct the project and he will be involving local schools and forming an after-school club.

We have also formed an adult archeological club which will meet every fortnight during the day and periodically at evenings and weekends.

There will be talks by other professionals and groups involved in current excavations elsewhere and visits to sites similar to those of Thornhill Hall and to local museums to find out the results of a previous excavation on the island in the 1960s.

We will be recovering fallen masonry which has been in the moat or covered by the undergrowth on the island which is now being cleared and we will be trying to identify where it came from with the hope that we can possibly rebuild part of the hall.

The project is being financed by the Heritage Lottery Fund and enthusiastically supported by Kirklees Council, for which we are very grateful.

If you are interested in taking part then please visit our website at www.rectory-park.co.uk or phone me on 01924 462888 or email [email protected].

WADE HYDE

Friends of Rectory Park