I have to admit that I struggled with history at school. Remembering all those dates and battles, and generals, kings and queens who seemed to bear no relation to my life, turned me off the notion of remembering our past for a good few years.

However, after I started working with children through drama, I realised what a potent and exciting field history can be. It is so obviously about people - their problems, joys, sorrows, choices, successes and tragedies.

In Wales our history is all around us; in the empty factory buildings, the local castle ruins, the remains of fish traps on the sea shore, the slag heaps, and the oddly shaped humps of earth on hilltops. It is in our languages, our memories, in treasured objects in our attics, and in the stories we hear from our parents and grandparents. It runs through our lives like golden thread, binding us together as families, as communities, and as a nation with a shared past.

The Burton diaries

When my colleagues and I were invited by the Richard Burton Archives in Swansea University to use the Burton diaries, which he began aged 14 - and now lodged there by his widow Sally who wished them to be used to inspire young people - I still felt doubtful.

How could these private documents throw light on young people’s lives and environments, especially at a time of industrial crisis in Port Talbot,  to the extent that they could feel that more was possible for them than they had dared to expect of life?

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Engaging young people in history

Once we got started, and with the exceptional drama skills of my colleague, Iona Towler Evans, it took a very short time for the young people to empathise intensely with Richard Burton, with his widow, and with the needs of the community.

We began by visiting Pontrhydyfen, where he was born and then continued to visit throughout his life; and Taibach, where he grew up, went to school, and was trained on the hillside above the town by his teacher, mentor and adopted father, Philip Burton.

After seeing the original diaries during a visit to the Archives, along with a host of objects that Burton used, we met his niece, Sian Owen. She gave us massive insights into his character and to the life of his family at the time, as well as the local people who remembered him or his relatives, and who explained about the mining and steel culture of the area.

The young people began saying things such as:

[quote= Student] "I thought I wouldn’t make it because I am a boy from the valleys – now I know I can." [/quote]

• ‘We are walking on the stones he may have walked on. It’s mind-blowing.’
• ‘Richard Burton was more than he appeared. We got beneath the surface and found the man behind the mask’
• ‘I have learned more about the place I live, its past, the present and a future we have the potential to create.’

This kind of response was inspirational for us as tutors and adults.

Exploring further afield

We saw theatre pieces – including a one-man piece, ‘Burton’ by the Swansea actor Rhodri Miles, and a play set in the 1930s about a person trying to find their true role in life, through writing a diary. This was on a mind-changing visit to Oxford, where Burton had spent time studying in Exeter College: the contrast with Taibach was unavoidable, as was the dignity and heritage of the city and the university.

We also got to speak to the Port Talbot actor, now internationally famous, Michael Sheen, who offered us some amazing insights into the power and problems of fame.

Having decided to make a film about Burton’s early life, the young people considered living conditions, house interiors, clothes and life in a colliery. They visited the Big Pit and St Fagan’s Folk Museum to learn more so that they could design costumes for the film and find authentic ways of interpreting Burton’s childhood.

Unlocking the value of heritage

Financial support from the National Lottery via the Heritage Lottery Fund enabled all this, along with some inspirational tuition in drama, film-making, art and music - and of course the young people’s own drive to realise their ambition of making a film. Partner organisations Swansea University, including the Taliesin Theatre, Neath Port Talbot College Group and the Port Talbot Library Services, all pitched in to support the young people, who achieved more - much more - than they had expected.

If I didn’t know it before, I have now fully realised that history is so much more than names and dates; if we use research, along with our imagination, it opens our minds to individuals’ joys and challenges, and to those of communities. Perhaps most important of all, it allows us to look inward, and to understand our own depths and potential.

As one of our students remarked: “I thought I wouldn’t make it because I am a boy from the valleys – now I know I can.”