Life on a Hill Sheep Farm in Weardale

The son of a miner with a passion for the County Durham landscape pays tribute to hard working hill sheep farmers in remote Weardale.

A gifted amateur filmmaker, Edward Roberts grew up in a mining community in County Durham and retained a passion for its landscape and people, which shines through in this sensitive, instructive portrait of traditional sheep farming in the harsh landscape of Weardale - herding flocks in mid-winter, sheep dipping, blade-shearing, and lambing in spring.

In 1930 Edward Roberts (1893-1975) became Headmaster of Broom School in Ferryhill and also a County Inspector for Schools in Durham City, Spennymoor and Weardale areas. He pioneered the use of visual aids in the classroom and, in his spare time, made several films including a beautiful colour documentary of Durham Miners Galas in the 1950s, and this celebration of age-old rural skills, now a record of a vanishing way of life in the Durham Dales. The film was made for the Audio-Visual Library he was creating for the Durham County Council Education Committee.