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Far from the Madding Crowd

The Greenwood Tree – September 2019

Posted on 27th August 2019

The September issue of The Greenwood Tree focuses on agricultural labourers, the ‘ag labs' that so many of us have in our family trees, with stories on farming folk sent in by members Editor Paul Radford previews the edition which will be mailed to members at the end of August and which SDFHS members can already view or download from the Members' Area of the Society’s website The front cover shows a scene from the filming on the Mapperton Estate of the 2015 version of Far From... more

From Slavery to the Workhouse

Posted on 2nd May 2017

I am sure many of us have discovered that one or more of our early family members went into the workhouse Sitting at our computers in our centrally heated homes we have tried to imagine what it might have been like with, perhaps, images coming to mind of Oliver Twist asking for more, or the heavily pregnant Fanny Robin, in Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd, painfully making her way to the workhouse to meet her fate We are likely to have gleaned that this was to be avoided at all... more

Sherborne is now Casterbridge

Posted on 23rd October 2013

Patricia Spencer describes the temporary transformation of the SDFHS centre Arriving this morning for a meeting at our Sherborne Centre we found that the exterior of our building had been transformed into 'The Friends' Alms-House' as it will appear in the new version of Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd which is being filmed in Sherborne this week There is a news report about the filming in Sherborne here on the BBC website Patricia... more

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