{"title":"Mel Dyke","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"grimethorpe-revival-book-mel-dyke-9781845631529","title":"Grimethorpe Revival","description":"1992 was the year Her Majesty The Queen referred to as an annus horribilis.  It wasn't that good a year for Grimethorpe either with the Government's announcement that 31 coal mines would close. Although a minor technicality, the failure to conduct the statutory \"consultation period\" of 90 days meant that the actual closure date had to be postponed until the start of 1993. So January of that year was not only the end of those 31 pits, but also the away of life in the traditional communities they supported.  Ironically it was also the year that the Grimethorpe Colliery Band won the World Brass Band Championship with a superb score of 99 marks out of a possible 100. \"Brassed Off\" told that story and the Band survived despite the cuts, but the 99 year old Grimethorpe pit did not. A Barnsley miner's daughter, Mel Dyke had worked in schools and colleges in the coalfields since the 1960s often using mining themes to raise aspiration and forging links through the support of local role models.  She was Deputy Head in Grimethorpe's Willowgarth High School when the announcement came. Determined not simply to wait for predictable and drastic affect closure would have, she a spearheaded a creative counter movement.  Combining her own previous experiences with work already begun in the school in 1984 by Head of English Max Bristowe, she sought nationwide support.  No-one could have foreseen the range of responses to the gloriously positive fight put up by that little community; from Westminster to Buckingham and Lambeth Palaces - and even an artichoke field in France! Here she provides that unique archive; letters and interviews, TV radio and press reports, MPs, academics and celebrity support, messages of goodwill inspiring children's writings and activities across the curriculum.  Twenty years on the left, right and centre views of some those involved, are re-visited to bring together the finer elements of past, present and future.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49598282400017,"sku":"GOR006137253","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1845631528.jpg?v=1751026895"},{"product_id":"barnsley-and-beyond-book-mel-dyke-9781845630416","title":"Barnsley and Beyond","description":"This book is about much more than one town in what was once called the West Riding of Yorkshire.  Barnsley is simply the base from which Mel Dyke began a journey round the world to meet people whose success and high achievement are linked to the area.  Many of the diverse personalities she interviewed cite their own educational experience as their inspiration.  Others felt it was despite that, and early under-achievement or a poor educational start instead spurred them on.  Mel uses their anecdotal accounts to reflect on the changes in education over the past sixty years, and to put the case for a revival of the arts in teaching, which she argues is currently at risk of being lost in schools, despite being generally accepted as a vital element in education.She unearths some intriguing local links in the form of great positive role models ranging from education to economics, Coronation Street to Ready Steady Cook, pop music to 'soliciting, sculpture to poetry, international fashion design and hairdressing, burns surgery to fire-fighting, archaeology in Egypt to Christianity in China. World champions in music and sport join past and present figures whose achievements continue to show the influence the area has had historically, and continues to have worldwide. The book's unlikely start is Sir David Attenborough, it closes with an Australian of the Year.Perceptive pen portraits of some fascinating characters etched in a sharp and deliberately provocative style, will inform, entertain - and rattle more than the odd sabre!Mel Dyke has written and been involved in the production of a number of local history titles. These include:All for Barnsley - published by Pen and Sword 2003.The Bus to Barnsley Market co-editor (with Ian Clayton and Brain Lewis )  published by Yorkshire Arts Circus 1989.The Grimethorpe 'Book in a Day'  was Mel's project to offer a coal community's response to the Government's pit closure policy, published by Willowgarth High School and Yorkshire Arts Circus 1992.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":50511009218833,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50511009513745,"sku":"GOR001847824","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1845630416.jpg?v=1750768027"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-mel-dyke.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}