Bringing the Past to Life

This is a 40 page souvenir of Pendon. It contains many images not previously published covering all of the main exhibits and in the case of The Vale Scene relates the models and landscape to the real-life setting.

\"The idea of recreating the English countryside in miniature form, thus immortalising the precious landscape of the Vale for successive generations, was born out of Roye’s concern for its long-term future. Wherever he went in the glorious Vale, he observed the sheer beauty of the countryside, but was all the while fearful that enormous change lay ahead and that what he loved most dearly might soon disappear.

A former pub at Wanborough, a village to which Roye would return many times over the years, proved to be the foundation for his ambitious project. The old ‘Calley Arms’ was a privately owned thatched cottage when Roye first set eyes on it in the years between the two World Wars. The cottage was to become the model for the Waggon & Horses, Roye’s first creation and part of a composite village he named ‘Pendon Parva.\"

This is an extract from ‘Bringing the Past to Life’, a Pendon Publication available from the museum shop or from our web shop.