User:Pinkmountain/Dorothy Maud Maxey

Dorothy Maud Maxey
Dorothy Maud Maxey (1919-2003) was a filmmaker, teacher and naturalist from East Anglia.Her films are dated from 1967-1985 and held at the East Anglian Film Archive in Norwich .She is one of the women amateur filmmakers apart of the Women in Focus project by the East Anglian Film Archive and the Irish Film Archive.

Born in 1919, Maxey was the daughter of William Ernest Sydney and Ada Maxey, both school teachers working in East Anglia.

Maxed started work as a teacher at Potterspury council school in 1940 till 1948 .During her time in Potterspury, Maxey was a member of the Potterspury Women’s Institute, fundraising and organising activities which were often linked to her job at the local school. Some of her handcrafted toys, clothing and preserves won competitions at W.I fundraisers.

Maxey moved to Norfolk in the 1950s and joined the Norfolk & Norwich Naturalists' Society where she served as president during 1977 till 1978 .During her time within the society, Maxey gave a number of lectures which included screenings of her nature based film footage.

As a filmmaker and naturalist, Maxey was keen to accurately document her subject matter,Open Your Eyes (1967),The Living Rainbow (1976) and The Patchwork Quilt (1976) are examples of her work.

Maxed served as headteacher of Dereham Church First School from 1965 till her retirement in 1979. At the time of her retirement, the Dereham Church First School PTA organised a special evening where Maxey’s amateur films were screened, these films included Dereham Church Infants School (1971) which documented the daily actives at the school such as children learning in the classroom and playing in the snow .Another one of the Dereham school films was Children in their Environment (1978), demonstrating how the langue and communication skills of students could be improved through engagement with local history and nature.

The East Anglian film archive houses a collection of Maxey’s films alongside the original handwritten notes which she produced in preparation for her film voice-overs.