www.ournewhaven.org.uk

I have found this website really useful with finding out information about the things my Great Grandma has spoken about in her account.

www.ournewhaven.org.uk

After going through the account, I went on to this website and had a look at the different sections and searched for relevant information that I could put in to my Ebook. In the account, my Great Grandma talks about a place called Guinness House, I found a few sections on this website which gave me information about the place and a brief history about it, there was also old pictures of the house on the website with some floor plans which I found helpful.

http://www.ournewhaven.org.uk/page_id__1842_path__0p3p84p.aspx

Here are a couple of points about Guinness House that I found on this website:

- It was designed by architect John L Denman and built by Ringmar Building works in 1938

- It provides an inexpensive holiday accommodation for 'working class' families from the Trust's London Estates

I also found out from the looking at the page, which I have taken a screen shot of, that there were secret tunnels underneath the house. My Grandma told me that my Great Grandma worked there as a steward during the war, I'll need to find out some more information about this so which I can include in my Ebook. 

Moving on from looking at Guinness House, I also used this site to have a look at WW2 camps and the area in which she lived at the time of the war. I found this website gave some really useful information and pictures that I'll be able to use in my Ebook and I found out things that we didn't initially know very much about.

http://www.ournewhaven.org.uk/page_id__2414_path__0p3p77p108p.aspx

I found some good ariel images of the area in which my Great Grandma lived and also some information about the area on this page.

Mount Pleasant, Newhaven

http://www.ournewhaven.org.uk/page_id__1872_path__0p3p77p108p.aspx

Whilst looking through the website I came across a section which talks about Army Transit Camps in Mount Pleasant, which is something that my Great Grandma mentions in her account. I had a look the page and found out quite a bit of information which I can include in my book. 

Here are some information that I found in this section:

"Newhaven hosted many temporary military camps over the years - the last one was the large military encampment created on Mount Pleasant 1940/41."

"70 years on, there is residual evidence remains of nearly 100 Nissen huts and about a dozen larger communal buildings that were sited a long the then undeveloped roads of Mount Pleasant."

"The physical evidence (much now disturbed) of former Nissen hits foundations lies in the flattened 'levels' parallel to and set back from some roads."

"A grand scheme for Mount Pleasant was published in 1904. Roads were laid out and water mains installed and the whole territory was divided up into 20ft wide by 100ft deep plots but for a variety of reasons (the Great War 1914-1918 and the post war recessions of the 1920's and 1930's) only a handful of properties ever materialised."

"The few street lamps that existed were disconnected because of wartime blackout regulations."

Research

Now that I have gone through the account I now know what information I need to find out and any relevant images that are available for me to use. 

I have spoken to my Grandma and found out some information to do with the account and about my Great Grandma. I found talking to my Grandma really interesting and found out things about my Great Grandma that I didn't know. 

This is a bit of bio about my Great Grandma which I am going to include near the beginning of the Ebook.

Research

Now that I have established the story that I want to do, I can now move on to start researching the content of it and take the opportunity to ask my Grandma questions about my Great Grandma and if she knew much about the time in which the account is written. 

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Before the initial researching stage, I thought about how the book will be broken up based on what my Great Grandma had written in her account. I went through the account and picked out some key points with in it.

I found going through the account and picking out key parts a great help. From doing this I've now got a clear idea of how to break down the account for my Ebook. 

My next steps…

Before I think about how I want my Ebook to visually, I need to sort out the content that I am going to put into it. What I'll need to do is go through the account in which my Great Grandma wrote and from there sort out each sections and take key parts out. From this point I'll be able to then sort out how I want to lay it out and what animations I want. 
Then I am going to move on to how I visually want my Ebook to look. I’ll need to think about relevant designs that would fit in with the account, this means I will need to research the era the account was written for inspiration, look for suitable fonts and think about colours and backgrounds.

I have already got some ideas about how I’m going to set out the Ebook and how I’ll break down the content in chapters. On saying this, I need to development and experiment with what I am thinking of by experimenting and coming up with mock ups whilst along side that coming up with sketches and storyboards in my sketch book. All of this will also be in preparation for my pitch in a weeks time.

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These are some rough and notes that I have come up with to do with my Great Grandma's account:

- Based on the account, could do her life during 1939

- A website called, www.ournewhaven.co.uk - I can use this site to find out more information and find images which are relevant to her account

- Break down each section of the account into sections

- She talks about rationing - maybe have animations of the amount of food

- Where she lived - Mount Pleasant, Denton - What she could see from her house - find images of the area

- What she did during the time

- I could perhaps include what my Great Grandad did as well

- Find suitable fonts to fit in with the theme of the time in which the account was written

- In the account she talks about posters - I could either find suitable images or draw them

- Audio, have the account read - See if my Grandma can do it

An Idea!

After coming up with some potential ideas, I then went on to talk to my Grandma to see if she knew of any family stories that I could use. At first she was bit stuck and couldn't initially think of anything, however after having a think she told me that she remembered she had an account that her Mum had written. She found it for me and showed me that it had been written about the 3rd September 1939, having had a look through what she had written I felt positive that I could use this as my idea for an Ebook. As well as giving me this she also had some pictures of her Mum and Dad and was happy for me to take these away and use. I knew I wanted to find out more as I knew that this would be a good idea for my project, I asked my Grandma some questions and asked if she had some more images that I could use. Below are the pictures of my Great Grandparents.

This is the account that my Grandma let me use.

Initial Ideas

In my sketch book I have started a double page spread of potential ideas based on what I know and what could potentially be used with more research. Here are some of my ideas:

- My Grandad coming from Malaysia -> perhaps talking to my Dad and seeing if he knows any of his family history, as my Grandad is on holiday.

- My Grandma and Grandad living in Malaysia lived in Malaysia for a few years -> they might have some interesting stories, my Dad also used to live out there when he was younger; he might have some funny/ interesting stories about what it was like living out there as a young boy and what school was like too.

- In Penang my family used to own whole street, which was quite an expensive area, they ended up giving it away to the church -> I would need to explore further into when this actually happened, why the did and try and source some relevant images.

- The house that I live in -> this is where my Grandma lived when she was young and grew up here, I could look into the family history of the house; find out when the house was built and pictures of it and the street during the time that my Grandma lived here.

- My Mum was one of the first babies born in 1970

First thoughts...

On receiving the brief, there wasn’t a family story that immediately came to mind. I did start by thinking about my grandparents and their childhoods but I was struggling to think of anything that I thought would be a good idea for an ebook. 
In my sketch I have began by drawing a rough family tree, I thought that this would help me to see who I can target and who to ask for good stories. I have also started doing a double page spread of ideas of potential stories that I can think of, and I'll be talking to my Grandparents and seeing what ideas I can come up with based on the knowledge I have received from them.
My initial thoughts of ideas are targeting my Grandad on my Dad's side and my Grandma on my Mum's side. My Grandad is Malaysian, so I'm thinking that I could find an interesting story through that, however it would be quite a struggle with finding information out as he is currently in Malaysia which means contacting him will be pretty hard. On the other hand I am really close to my Grandma so I can easily talk to her about her family's history and gather helpful documents and pictures to use.