BBC News, Suffolk
BBCA new documentary will explore World War Two air raid shelters under a school’s playground.
Jeremy Spake, 56, from Great Bentley, Essex, is making a film about the Clifford Road tunnels at Clifford Road Primary School in Ipswich.
He learned about them during a conversation with a volunteer while producing another documentary at Sutton Hoo and was immediately intrigued.
Mr Spake is now looking to interview anyone with a connection to the tunnels and stressed he was interested in even the “most tenuous” of links.
There are three tunnels under the primary school’s playground that were constructed in 1939 to be used as air raid shelters.
They were forgotten about after the war until their rediscovery in 1989 and have since been turned into a heritage site and museum.
Jeremy SpakeMr Spake said he “fell in love” with the tunnels during a visit and had already begun to speak with a few people who remembered them from the 1940s.
“I went along and I was just blown away by it because there are only something like four or five locations in Britain that still have these school-based air raid shelters,” he explained.
“The amazing thing is that when you walk along Clifford Road, you would have no idea those tunnels are there.
“That’s why I love it. It’s like a piece of secret history that everybody seems to want to keep secret, which is why I want to tell the story properly and capture the interesting stories of the people who were involved.”
Mr Spake is looking to speak to anyone who can remember the tunnels or anyone with an association with them, including their relatives who helped build them during the war.
Their stories will then be turned into a documentary for the museum, but he was also in the process of talking with broadcasters in the hope of getting it on TV.
Mr Spake said he hoped to have it completed by April next year and said anyone could contact him through his website.