Laura

Laura and I met at university, and she agreed, when we graduated, to move up to Newcastle from her native Hertfordshire. From the very beginning, work was incredibly important to her. She defined herself by it.

After starting out with a shop job in Eldon Square - do people remember Past Times? - she moved into funding advice at the National Lottery Charities Board behind the Live Theatre, close to Swan House Roundabout, and then North Tyneside VODA at Linskill in North Shields.

I think it was VODA which really cemented her love for her adopted North East. She loved helping out small organisations such as the Tynemouth Model Boat Club and many, many others. During this time, she also started a law course, qualifying in criminal, contract, and I think property law.

Then came the beginning of her career in heritage, perhaps foreshadowed by Past Times, when she amazingly landed the job of Museum and Education Manager at Bede’s World. The museum had received a multimillion-pound capital grant (remember them?) to turn the small Bede Monastery Museum into a major attraction. She threw herself into the interpretation for the permanent exhibition, and early on had to recommend the postponement of the grand opening, not an easy thing to have to say in a new job.

We married in 2001. And around this time, Laura successfully completed an MA in Museum Studies. She later had her prime professional focus and commitment acknowledged in her appointment as Curator at Bede’s World, later stepping up to Acting Director.

The plan was then devised, and the partnership formed, to bid for World Heritage Status for Wearmouth-Jarrow. Laura was appointed jointly by Sunderland and North Tyneside councils to work on the bid. The bid was ultimately unsuccessful. A lack of support and belief from a key senior individual at DCMS combined with an academically inept application assessment guaranteed that the bid could not succeed. The assessor’s report described the standing Anglo-Saxon remains at Wearmouth-Jarrow as being less significant than those at Lindisfarne. There are no standing Anglo-Saxon remains at Lindisfarne. Despite this, the Wearmouth-Jarrow board decided not to appeal. Laura strongly disagreed with this decision.

It was during Laura’s time at Wearmouth-Jarrow that Alys arrived, as if she didn’t have enough on her plate already. Alys’s achievements made her prouder than Alys probably knows.

Laura then joined Northumberland National Park Authority, where I worked, to build the funding case for The Sill, a new visitor centre on Hadrian’s Wall. This marrying of her love of heritage and the countryside with her knowledge of funding and the law was an inspiration for her, and she played a big role in achieving success. After the failure of the Wearmouth-Jarrow project, this was incredibly important to her. I was proud to play a small part in the fitting out of the Sill to achieve the vision of which she had been a huge part.

A short stint at South Tynedale Heritage Railway followed, and around this time, Barnaby joined us. It was an extremely hard pregnancy, but Laura kept working. Barnaby’s apparently bottomless kindness and humour have been the hugest joy to Laura. I’m not sure she would have made it this far without Alys and him.

Then followed Laura’s decade at the Arts Council. During her time there, she helped such organizations as Beamish, Woodhorn, Bowes Museum, Sunderland Museums, and of course her beloved Jarrow Hall. Much like her time at VODA, she loved being involved in the cultural heritage scene of the North East and the rest of the country, and her role a Relationships Manager dealing specifically with Museums meant that she’d successfully continued her professional life in heritage until the end.

This piece concentrates on Laura’s work. It was so unbelievably important to her. I have always been, and will always remain, in total awe of what she achieved.