THE CURTAIN has gone up on a campaign to literally put the lamp in Lamproom by transforming Barnsley miners’ lamps into the theatre’s house lights.
The theatre needs to raise about £20,000 for the ambitious project that will celebrate the town’s coal mining heritage by using a lamp from every post-war colliery in Barnsley to illuminate the auditorium.
Ruth Pearson, theatre manager, said the idea has been waiting in the wings for almost 20 years, having first been mentioned shortly after the building reopened in 1999.
She said: “We have miners’ lamps in the bar which are in cabinets and one of our trustees at the time when we opened thought it would be a nice idea to have miners’ lamps in the auditorium as the house lights. At that time we didn’t have the money to think of anything as ambitious as that.
“As time has gone on people have added bits to the lamps with plates and things but it has always been the intention at some point to put the lamps into the auditorium with little plaques for each saying who it was donated by and which colliery it is from.
“The trustees have decided the time has come to start spending money on the building on doing nicer things rather than just keeping the doors open and we feel we are at that stage.”
The lamps were donated to the theatre by local people in memory of the miners who carried them and the hope is to have one from every post-war colliery in Barnsley.
Ruth said should any be missing from the collection, an appeal will be put out asking for the public’s help to make it complete.
“Each lamp will be made to light up and dim down,” said Ruth.
“As well as the electrician doing that the walls have to be looked at because they are stone and it’s not a case of just making a hole in the wall, we will have to put a false wall in. It’s going to be difficult but doable.”
Designs are being drawn up to work out where the lamps will go and how they will be installed in the Grade II listed building. The aim is to start work in August 2018 in time for the autumn 2018 season starting.
A Crowdfunding page has already been set up to kick start the money-raising campaign with a target of £6k which it is hoped Barnsley Council can match-fund up to a maximum of £2k.
A further boost came at the weekend when £1k was raised through a sponsored rowing undertaken by two members of the Friends of the Lamproom Theatre.
n If you would like to donate to the campaign search ‘Lamproom Theatre - Celebrating Our Mining Heritage’ on crowdfunder.co.uk.
