Memory Talks, oral history audio and podcasts, archives collected for the Dorset History Centre, community reminiscence and community plays and inclusive events at Portland Museum/ Lyme Museum and Dorset Museum

Heart of Stone project was founded by Sarah Acton and the Portland Museum in 2018 as an oral history project and writing residency. The residency ran events to collect and share memories and stories of former quarrymen and Portland Stone in community conversations/events. In 2020 Sarah’s play using some of the oral histories, was devised and perfomed by The Portland Players, a community group, together with a professional theatre team together with Island Voices Community Choir, performed at b-side in 2021. The project obtained further funding to tour a new play across Dorset in 2022.

Thanks to the quarrymen, Portland Poets and everyone who has supported this massive project so far – bringing joy and storytelling to some of Portland’s many stories of Portland stone, landscape and lives shaped by the stone industry.

Heart of stone community events and plays 2021-22

2019 writing residency