Our blogging and social media prompts have been designed with our members in mind, but anyone can take part – even if they don’t have a formal one-place study (see One-place study blogging prompts 2021 – everyone’s invited!). The prompts are a series of monthly themes or topics for one-place study activities. Those activities can be any or all of the following:
You are free to use any or all of these prompts – you might look at the topics and see that you can do something for January, March, April and June but not for February or May, for example. We hope that this approach will be flexible enough to give everyone an opportunity to take part, whatever the nature of your Place, your favourite areas of research, or the amount of time you have available.
Articles on the topics written by members for Destinations can be sent to the editor at any time for publication, but where possible please post related blog and social media posts during the relevant months.
Hopefully you will find at least one topic which will spark your interest and prompt you to participate. If not, we have more to come – Hopefully you will find lots of topics which will spark your interest and prompt you to participate – and we have more to come! You can of course put forward suggestions for any that you would like to see included.
Where were the shops – and who were the shopkeepers – serving your OPS residents, and what were their stories? What was bought and sold, and in what ways did that change over time? Have you found postcards or other pictures, or advertisements in newspapers or directories, for the shop(s) in your place, or for shops nearby which your OPS residents may have patronised – or worked at? Where else, besides shops, did your OPS residents purchase goods and gifts: where and when were markets held, for example, or have you found any itinerant traders, peddlers or hawkers, or ‘travelling salesmen’ in your place? This being a prompt for December, Christmas shopping is also very much included!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceShopping
If you have found armorial bearings used by people in your place, perhaps displayed on monuments on or in houses or the church, or on bookplates, tell us about them, and share what you have learned (or want to find out) about them. Where a shield or escutcheon is ‘quartered’ to combine other coats of arms, to whom did those additional arms belong and what do they tell us about the ancestry of the bearer? Places can have coats of arms too – is your place one of them, or does it fall within a such a place? There’s a lot of terminology to get to grips with in heraldry, but also lots to learn about people and places!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceHeraldry
What events did this season spark in your place, as Summer ended and the rigours of Winter neared? Do you have accounts or records relating to autumnal farming practices or traditions in your place, or photos – old or new – showing your place during Autumn? Apple Day, a celebration of apples and orchards, was launched in 1990 and fits nicely with this prompt: were there orchards in your OPS? Cider presses? Or favourite foods made with apples? What wild foods might the people of your place have gathered at this time of year, back in the day? Feel free to use the alternative hashtag #OnePlaceFall if you wish!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceAutumn
You might notice the slightly different format of this prompt! It ties in with the tenth anniversary of the Society for One-Place Studies, but is also a topic which stands by itself as a prompt for you to look at the number 10 in the context of your OPS. Tentative ideas include: ten pictures (photos, postcards etc) of your place; the ‘top ten’ first names, surnames or occupations in your place; ten favourite documents or sources; ten women; a timeline of ten events in your place; a house history of Number 10 in one of your place’s streets; ten fascinating facts about your place.
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceStudies10
A cricket-related prompt? No, this one is about boundaries of all sorts, including those relating to property, and to church and civil administration; boundaries which delineated your place, lay within your place, or within which your place fell. How, when and by whom were those boundaries created and marked? Did they change over time, were customs (such as beating the bounds) associated with them, did they give rise to disputes? You could also consider the geographical and temporal boundaries set for your OPS – what are they, why did you choose them, have you modified them since you started your study (to expand your OPS, or reduce its scope and make it more manageable)?
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceHomes
The first of four prompts based on the seasons, this one presents numerous avenues for research. Were there Summer picnics or outings in your place, recorded in newspaper reports, family photos, diaries, oral histories or other sources? Did the people of your place go on Summer holidays elsewhere, or was your place itself a destination for holidaymakers? Were there open gardens or fetes, or Summer sports such as tennis or cricket, in your place? With the latter sport in mind, we’re certain you won’t ‘run out’ of ideas or be ‘stumped’ for topics to write about in detail (or share via ‘summery’ social media posts)! For studies in the southern hemisphere, you may wish to ‘seasonally adjust’ the timing of this and our other ‘seasons’ prompts!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceSummer
The second half of the year brings with it the return of the Bonus Prompt, a broad topic which you can use instead of, or in addition to, any of the monthly prompts – or ignore, as you see fit! A chance for you to share details of your favourite discoveries about your Place and its people, including your ancestors if they lived in your OPS Place.
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceDiscoveries
What modes of transportation were (or are!) available to the people in your Place? How did this change over time, and how did these changes affect the Place and its people?
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceTransport
A chance to focus on the houses, apartments, cottages, farms, etc., that people in our Study places lived. This could be an overview of some or many of them, or more in-depth house histories of individual properties, as is appropriate for your Study place.
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceHomes
What mysteries are associated with your OPS Place? Or, what mysteries have you encountered in your research and cracked – or maybe those ones you’ve never been able to solve… maybe publishing something about it will encourage someone to help you figure it out!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceMysteries
Who were the employers in your Place? What types of employment did they provide, and how did this change over time? Censuses, trade directories and even phone books can offer potential areas for research in this topic, along with loads of other sources, so why not dig in!
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceEmployers
Any type of picture could be your inspiration this month! Artwork, sketches, photos, postcards – anything that you’ve found about or in your Place, or taken or created of your Place – and of course, the significance of those pictures.
Social media hashtag: #OnePlacePictures
This can be about your own One-Place Study archives, how you’ve used archives for your One-Place Study, or even something interesting, exciting or different you found in an archive search.
Social media hashtag: #OnePlaceArchives
The Society for One-Place Studies is a leading organisation dedicated to supporting One-Placers worldwide.
By email:
info@one-place-studies.org
By post:
Society for One-Place Studies,
28 St Ronan’s Avenue,
Southsea, Hampshire, PO4 0QE
United Kingdom
© The Society for One-Place Studies