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Saturday 3rd May 2008
There are signs
of frustration among members of the newly formed Bourne Preservation Society
over their efforts to restore and manage the Victorian chapel in the town
cemetery. They turned up in force at the annual parish meeting on Tuesday
expecting a decision in their favour only to be told that this was not the time
or place and that a working party of councillors was being formed to consider
the issue.
This sounds ominous and the society is naturally dismayed, having drawn up an
admirable plan of intention in a matter of weeks which needs only the
endorsement of a council that has dithered and delayed over the future of the
chapel for the past thirty years with the result that it is now in urgent need
of attention. It would therefore have seemed reasonable that the objections
being offered by councillors for not taking a decision might have been overruled
if it meant that the society could start work straight way.
Mrs Helene Currell, the society’s secretary, said that despite being so well
attended, the outcome of the meeting was disappointing. “How much longer is this
going to take?”, she asks. “The chapel is not watertight and needs urgent
attention with regard to this but winter will be here before we know it.”
Unfortunately, a decision over whether the chapel should be handed over to the
society looks a long way off. The working party has still to be appointed and
with the annual meeting and mayor making in May, its deliberations are unlikely
to go before the full council
until the end of June. Time therefore slips by, as it has in previous years,
with nothing being achieved while that first flush of enthusiasm generated by
people who want to do something about it is slowly being defused by the
council’s inactivity. The Duke of Edinburgh famously offered this advice on
another occasion that seems appropriate now, that councillors should pull their
fingers out, because it will be a sad day for Bourne and for this fine Victorian
building if the current impetus should founder on the rocks of bureaucratic
procedure.
Incense is to be used at the Abbey Church in Bourne for special services
during the next twelve months to test the reaction of the congregation and if
they find it agreeable, it is likely to become an integral part of worship in
the future.
The basic ingredients of incense are gums and resins extracted from various
aromatic biotic materials such as wood, seeds, roots, flowers and leaves, and it
releases fragrant smoke when burned, the term incense referring to the substance
itself rather than to the odour it produces, having been used for a multitude of
purposes since the dawn of civilisation.
Not only has it been used in medicine and for its aesthetic value but it has
also been associated with religious and ritual ceremonies from pagan times and
can be used to obscure less desirable odours. The church have used it since the
middle of the fourth century, one of the earliest applications being in the
botafumeiro, the famous thurible or swinging metal container installed in the
cathedral at Santiago de Compostela to hide the smell of the many tired,
unwashed pilgrims huddled together there, and still in use today to greet the
thousands who gather there every year after making the famous walk along the Way
of St James, the mediaeval pilgrimage route to the city through northern Spain.
The use of incense in religion is prevalent in many cultures, especially in the
east and particularly in India, Japan, Vietnam and Tibet, and one common belief
is that it was used as a form of sacrificial offering to a deity. Throughout
history, a wide variety of materials have been used in making incense although
there has always been a preference for locally available ingredients. Sage and
cedar, for instance, were used by the North American Indians while on the other
side of the world there was much ancient trading in incense materials from one
area to another which comprised a major part of commerce along the Silk Road and
other trade routes, one notably called the Frankincense Trail. Its origins are
therefore deeply rooted in the pre-Christian past and with many spiritual
associations, hence its appeal to those who endorsed the hippie subculture
during the early 1960s.
Opposition to incense and indeed many forms of ritual was prevalent in the
Church of England during the later years of the 19th century when certain
practices were frowned upon including the use of vestments such as the chasuble,
biretta, cope, and mitre, unleavened (wafer) bread in communion, the use of
bells at the elevation of the host, the decoration of churches with statues of
saints, pictures of religious scenes and icons and the use of Catholic
terminology such as describing the eucharist as the mass. Those who opposed them
were defending what they saw as the fundamentally Protestant identity of the
Church of England and that Catholic worship was somehow un-English, Catholicism
being deeply associated in many minds with cultural identities which
historically, many English people had commonly treated with suspicion,
especially the Spanish, the French, and the Irish.
In recent times, incense continues to be associated with the Roman Catholic
Church, the smells and bells of ritual and ceremony so beloved by its clergy,
but occasionally still makes an appearance in some Protestant churches although
not all will sanction its use for fear of upsetting the congregation. For
instance, I spent my early years as a choirboy in a small parish church seventy
years ago where the aged vicar and his young curate were both traditionalists
who abhorred anything that smacked of high church, knowing that the slightest
whiff of incense would be regarded as a sinister and sickly intrusion and likely
to result in rows of empty pews at evensong.
The experiment at the Abbey Church comes after the parochial church council
agreed to use it for a one year trial on high days and holy days, at those
services which are celebrated at Epiphany, Easter, Whitsun, Christmas, and other
special festivals. The reaction of worshippers will then be considered when the
situation is reviewed at their meeting in February 2009. The result will be an
interesting reflection of the religious motivation of those who regularly attend
the church and whether they are prepared to accept more symbolism in their
worship in an age where simplicity of style is becoming increasingly
fashionable.
May Day has been a cause for celebration since the earliest times
although today a more secular version is observed by many schools and churches
as well as being synonymous with trade unionism as Labour Day, celebrating the
social and economic achievements of the socialist movement. Its origins,
however, remain pagan and are reflected in the many customs that survive, the
best known being dancing around the maypole and the crowning of a may queen.
The day was a traditional summer holiday in many pre-Christian European pagan
cultures. While February 1st was the first day of the spring season, May 1st was
the first day of summer, hence, the summer solstice on June 25th (now June 21st)
was midsummer. In the Roman Catholic tradition, May is observed as Mary's month
and in these circles May Day is usually a celebration of the Blessed Virgin Mary
whose head is often adorned with flowers in works of art and school plays. The
giving of May baskets or small containers of sweets and flowers, usually left
anonymously on neighbours' doorsteps, were also a tradition but now fading in
popularity.
A version of this was popular here in Bourne a century ago and always the reason
why children should be allowed a day off school, either officially or simply
through staying away. The log book which has survived at the former council
school in Abbey Road, now the Abbey Road Primary, records many such occasions
and an entry on 5th May 1905 gives us a glimpse of the custom because it says:
“Very poor attendance on May morning, so many of the girls were going round with
garlands”. This was one of the May Day traditions faithfully upheld in the town
before the Great War of 1914-18, when a clothes basket would be decorated,
filled with bouquets of wild flowers and then covered with a sheet and girls
would take it from house to house offering a look inside for a halfpenny a time,
a most agreeable excuse to skip the classroom on a fine sunny day but unlikely
to serve as an acceptable explanation for absence today.
Cowslips would have been a popular choice for these floral offerings
because in years past the countryside was full of them at this time of the year,
on roadside verges and the field’s edge, on common land and woodland boundaries,
and I can remember from my boyhood trooping home from a day out with bunches of
these beautiful spring flowers as a present for my mother and they would be
placed carefully in a jam jar on the kitchen sill to delight her in the days to
come. Today, they are a much rarer sight because their numbers have been
decimated by intensive farming and by plant collectors who dig them up to
decorate their gardens although many small habitats still survive in isolated
places.
The cowslip (Primula veris) comes from the same family as the primrose
and also had similar uses, the name being a polite form of cowslop or cowpat,
referring to its occurrence in scattered clumps in cattle pasture land. The
flowers when collected in full bloom during April or May make a wine which was
once recommended as a cure for insomnia while an ointment they produced was
claimed to cure spots and wrinkles. As with primroses, they are a protected
species and it is now an offence to pick the blooms or dig up the plants yet
there seem fewer about now than in previous years. Are the vandals still abroad
in the countryside? However, several patches can be found on the wide grassy
verges around the Bourne area, especially on the back road between Greatford and
Belmesthorpe, at Carlby, Hanthorpe and Manthorpe, nodding their dainty heads in
the gentle breeze of a sunny May morning to make your journey well worthwhile
but if you do stop, then capture them only with your camera.
Messages from abroad: The picture of the bluebells in Dole Wood last week
is beautiful and brings back happy memories when my friend and I used to stay at
Kate's Bridge some 70 or more years ago and walk through there. - Winnie
Nowak, Anchorage, Alaska USA, Monday 28th April 2008.
Just wanted to thank you for the wonderful photo of bluebells. I miss seeing
them in the spring as they are not found in U S woodlands. I often look for them
only to be disappointed, even though after living here for 27 years I am fully
aware that I will not find them blooming. Hope springs eternal and I keep
thinking that may be one day . . . - Janet Fischer, Indianapolis, Indiana
USA, Monday 28th April 2008.
What the local newspapers are saying: The credit crisis currently
gripping the country is having its effect on town centre trade in Bourne and
The Local devotes its front page to the problems facing shopkeepers and
other commercial activities (May 2nd, not April 2nd as the newspaper dates its
current issue). Jane Good, chairman of the Chamber of Trade, suggests the faint
hope that if petrol goes up any more, people might stay here and shop rather
than driving into Peterborough but the outlook is not good. “Everyone is being
careful with their money and are buying things such as clothes when they need
them rather than when they want them”, she said. But the outlook is more
cheerful at the Angel Hotel, one of the town’s foremost places for eating and
drinking where manager Chris Falco remains positive, claiming that it is
business as usual. “We are a luxury”, he explained. “If there was a credit
crisis we would be one of the first industries to suffer.”
Thought for the week: The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,
nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses needed efforts to
convert retreat into advance. - Franklin D Roosevelt, 32nd president of the
United States, in his first inaugural address in 1933 during the depths of the
great American depression (1882-1945).
Saturday 10th May 2008
Earmarked for closure - see "The public toilets . . . "
Historians lean
heavily for their research on old documents and although they are a valuable
source for a great deal of material, they are not always reliable. There are
many instances of documents not being exactly what they purport to be and in
recent times the Hitler Diaries were exposed as fakes in 1983 despite being
bought by The Sunday Times and endorsed by an eminent historian of the day,
Professor Hugh Trevor-Roper, while only this week it was revealed that a large
number of historic papers relating to Britain’s perfidy during WW2 which form
part of the National Archive, the official custodian of Britain’s glorious past,
were the work of a master forger.
Closer to home, the story of Hereward the Wake, as well as many other tales from
this part of South Lincolnshire, rely on the narrative of Ingulph, a Benedictine
abbot of Crowland Abbey in the 11th century whose chronicle was regarded by
scholars as authentic but the manuscript has since been found to have been a
forgery written two or three hundred years after his death.
But perhaps these are extreme cases and rarely come the way of local historians
who are more likely to encounter the work of enthusiastic amateurs who
exaggerated and romanticised rather than fabricated.
The story of Hereward has certainly been embroidered over the years, notably by
several Victorian historical writers such as Charles Kingsley and Charles
Macfarlane while more recently, Christopher Marlowe (not to be confused with the
16th century dramatist) added his four-pennyworth in 1926 with a colourful
account in his book Legends of the Fenland People which was required reading in
my early schooldays.
One of the great church celebrations of past times was the Bourne Pageant which
was held in the garden of the old vicarage [now the Cedars retirement home] in
1938 to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the founding of the abbey by Baldwin
Fitzgilbert in 1138. There were several days of events and on this occasion, a
service was held in the open air with a fully robed choir while special stands
were erected around the lawn for the congregation. Among the re-enactments
staged by parishioners was that of monks taking the body of Hereward the Wake by
river to Crowland Abbey for burial, although it has been established since that
this incident has no foundation in fact, thus proving that fictionalised
accounts from our history have persisted into recent times.
The history of Bourne has suffered particularly from contributors who may not
have been fully conversant with their subject, either by not having lived here
or who visited only briefly, and there are many examples of one copying the
other with the result that mistakes are repeated from one volume to the next yet
still quoted as fact by the lazy and the unwary.
Yet it would take only a moment’s thought to realise that no one could possibly
cover an entire county and give accurate accounts of each village and town
without consulting an outside source and this is indeed how it happened. Among
the oft-quoted authorities is one of Lincolnshire’s earliest historians William
Marrat (1772-1852) whose main interest was commercial because his occupation was
that of a printer whose firm, Marrat and Company, operated from premises in High
Street, Boston.
It was his idea to chronicle the history of every town and large village and
publish the results monthly as a series of small gazetteers for sale but after a
few months realised that it was too big a task for one man to visit and describe
them all. He therefore enrolled the aid of a learned gentleman in each place,
usually the schoolmaster or the parson, who sent their manuscripts to his
printing works where the booklets were produced and eventually distributed for
sale. In the event, the first publications were so successful and help from all
quarters so forthcoming, that Marrat changed his objective and eventually mapped
and made several topographical surveys of the county between 1814 and 1817, so
completing the entire area of Lincolnshire in three years in a series of 31 slim
volumes although the evidence is that he visited only one or two places himself.
These publications are now rare but I have been fortunate to find an almost
complete set and although in rather a battered condition, still readable and
containing details of his methods of obtaining information about each locality.
The Bourne entry is important in that it proves that the contents have been
repeated elsewhere in earlier and subsequent years, in part or in whole, ad
infinitum, mistakes and all. The date of the first publications was 1814-16 and
the information requested by and supplied to Marrat set a standard for that used
regularly in the various county directories such as Kelly’s and White’s,
published throughout the 19th and well into the 20th centuries. All carry long
descriptive accounts of the town but close inspection reveals that they are all
very much alike and in many instances came from the same pen.
It is also apparent that much of what Marrat published came in fact from a
previous historian, John Moore, who wrote an account of Bourne in 1809 under the
patronage of Mrs Eleanor Pochin, widow of George Pochin (1732-98), Lord of the
Manor of Bourne Abbots, to which it is dedicated. This is a lengthy account and
contains many references that have since been disproved, particularly the claim
that the Gunpowder Plot was hatched at the Red Hall although we now know that it
was not built until 1605 when the perpetrators had already been discovered yet
this assertion still appears in some articles and guidebooks today as an
indication that old tales live on despite being disproved by later research.
As with Moore, Marrat’s description of Bourne is a long and tortuous, and often
inaccurate historical account. Printing was still at an early stage and
publications such as this had little regard for conformity or the niceties of
language that we know today and so his writing is full of spelling
contradictions and errors of punctuation and grammar yet these entries continue
to be quoted as an authoritative source. Perhaps Henry Ford was closer to the
mark than he realised when he said that history is bunk.
The toilets in Bourne Wood will only remain open if the public is
prepared to pay for them. The Forestry Commission which is responsible has made
its position quite clear that reduced funding has made cuts in the provision of
visitor facilities inevitable and that the lavatory block is among of the first
victims. Other cuts may follow, particularly the children’s play area, wayside
seats, woodland trails and markers, but have been put on hold for the time being
because of the current outcry although they are unlikely to survive for much
longer.
The commission claims that the toilets are in such a poor condition that they no
longer meet health and safety standards and that there is no money to either
maintain or replace them. Protests from local groups, particularly the Friends
of Bourne Wood, have fallen on deaf ears, despite the woodland being a regular
venue for many mass events which attract parents and their children. Instead,
when the need arises, they will have to disappear into the undergrowth which can
hardly be an acceptable solution when hundreds more people are milling around.
This information stems from a statement by the commission about its intentions
at the insistence of Councillor Mark Horn, a member of both Bourne Town Council
and Lincolnshire County Council, who was spurred into action because of the
strength of public concern. “The rationale for the decision is simple", he said.
"With increasing health and safety obligations and at a time of budgetary
restraint, the commission does not have the funds. The alternative therefore is
to introduce parking fees to cover the cost of maintenance of the toilets and
other facilities or close them and leave access free. These are choices faced by
most providers of public services. Money is tight. The choice for the people of
Bourne is whether we want toilets and other recreational facilities in Bourne
Wood. If so, are we prepared to pay for them through the introduction of car
parking charges? I do not know, but I am keen to hear your views."
The commission has stressed however that the problem of visitor amenities it
quite a separate issue from the suggested bypass through the wood. Their
statement says: “Unfortunately, the subject of recreational facilities and the
Larkfleet Homes development proposals have become merged in the eyes of the
community and for that reason the removal of way marking and the play area has
been deferred for one year. The toilets, however, are so poor that they will
close.”
What the local newspapers are saying: An optimistic story appears on the
front page of The Local suggesting that the old red brick corn warehouse
in Burghley Street might be converted for use as a community base for the arts
(May 9th), an excellent idea but one that comes firmly under the heading of pie
in the sky and there are many precedents. The most notable one in recent years
is that The Croft, an abandoned mansion in North Road currently the subject of a
planning wrangle between developers and the local authority, might be turned
into a hospice or some other amenity beneficial to the town, but all fall at the
first hurdle of financial backing.
Bourne is full of enthusiastic people who wish to see nothing but good from new
developments but unfortunately they have to cope with councils that put staff
salaries and pensions before public services and so in the future we are likely
to see less provision for leisure and amenities than at any time since the
present system of local government was introduced in 1894. The current situation
is that the use of land and buildings is now dictated by commercial developers
and although the Burghley Street warehouse has recently been purchased by South
Kesteven District Council, it is in the middle of the town centre redevelopment
area and so any future use will be dictated by whichever company buys it and
that is most likely to be one that is willing to turn it into residential
accommodation because there is no profit in altruistic projects and the planning
gain has become difficult to enforce. Indeed, the £27 million redevelopment
scheme itself is dependent entirely on the developers because they provide the
bulk of the investment and therefore call the tune with SKDC playing little more
than a walk on role and as staffing numbers and entitlements continue to rise,
that is the way it will be in the future.
It is reckoned that Mr Colman made his fortune from the mustard that was
left on the plate after a meal and the paint manufacturers appear to be
following this policy of profiting from what we throw away. Every spring, as
thoughts turn to the maintenance of home and garden, it is time to check the
contents of the shed for the varnishes, emulsions, glosses and satins needed for
this job, to touch up here and to recoat there, but the task always proves to be
more expensive than was envisaged because the leftovers so carefully stored last
year have invariably dried out and a new tin is needed.
Adding to the expense is the insistence of suppliers to use only large tins and
even if you need only a few brush strokes you can never find a small one and
when I put this to my shopkeeper he gave me that age old excuse that there was
no demand and everyone wanted the big container even though I was there in his
shop disproving this statement. Retailers are meant to be consumer driven but
the dictum of past times that the customer is always right has long since gone
by the board and today you either buy the way they sell it, no matter how
expensive or inconvenient, or go without.
The only way to change this, as with so many other systems that operate against
the public interest, is to boycott those who refuse to comply and let them
suffer the financial consequences but unfortunately we live in an age where most
people shun concerted action, even though it might improve our lot, and are
perfectly happy to put up with life as it is, no matter how inconvenient it may
be. Never has the old slogan “I’m alright, Jack” had a deeper resonance in
society than today when the truth is that standards are being slowly eroded by
suppliers of commodities and services who are calling the tune irrespective of
public demand and making a handsome profit into the bargain. While we continue
to accept what is on offer without question we are likely to wake up one morning
soon to find ourselves in thrall to our shops and supermarkets with their policy
of take it or leave it and the old concept of retailers providing what the
buyers actually want little more than a distant memory.
Thought for the week: The young have aspirations that never come to pass;
the old have reminiscences of what never happened. - Saki (Hector Hugh
Munro), British writer best known for his short stories (1870-1916).
Saturday 17th May 2008
A remarkable environmental achievement comes to fruition
next weekend with the opening of the newly restored water wheel at Baldock’s
Mill in South Street, Bourne.
The experiment in producing green energy is the brainchild of Jim Jones, aged
68, a retired engineer and active member of the Civic Society who has been
responsible for the design, construction and installation as part of a project
which originally began in September 2002 with the building of a wooden replica
of the original wheel. But once this was up and running as a visitor attraction,
he decided on a more ambitious scheme by constructing a durable, metal
waterwheel with a practical purpose. Design work began in September 2007 and
after eight months of hard work, the wheel is now generating electricity to
offset the rising cost of heating and lighting the building which is home to the
town’s Heritage Centre.
There has been a watermill on this site since the Domesday Book of 1086 but the
present building dates back to 1800 and for well over a century was powered by
the fast flowing waters of the Bourne Eau to grind corn and taking its name from
the last family to work it, i e Baldock. The mill wheel was 15 ft in diameter by
3 ft wide and there was a smaller fly wheel measuring 5 ft by 1 ft. Corn was
brought in to be ground into animal feed by farmers and smallholders who paid
for the grinding. Maize was also split for chicken feed and horse beans and a
flour dresser provided sufficient for the family's own use.
Two sets of stones operated on the first floor fed from hoppers on the floor
above, the corn being lifted up from the ground floor where it had been
previously delivered by a chain hoist driven, like the stones, by the wooden
undershot water wheel. Access to the two upper floors by the miller was by
ladders. The mill operated twice a day for three hours and this time was
increased by the digging of the leg of the river between the paddock that is now
the War Memorial Gardens and the Wellhead cottage. After powering Baldock's
Mill, the water then ran downstream and could be used by Notley's Mill in
Eastgate which was demolished in 1970.
A gas engine was run at other times to provide power and as the owner, Mr
Frederick Baldock, ran a carpentry and timber business from the premises, it
also kept his saw bench in operation. Ground meal was packed on the downstairs
floor, using the same bags brought in by the farmers, then hoisted up to the
store on the first floor ready for collection via a wooden chute that was
attached to the iron bar that can still be seen today below the stable door
entrance. The mill stopped working about 1924 when the water wheel collapsed and
the owner, the Marquess of Exeter, called in experts to inspect the damage but
decided not to repair it because of the high costs involved.
The mill has had several uses since then and in 1977 it was listed Grade II as
being of architectural and historic interest and in 1981, Bourne Civic Society
sought permission to turn it into a Heritage Centre and Bourne United Charities
agreed to lease them the building for a peppercorn rent in order that it would
be preserved for community use. The agreement was renewed in 2002 for a further
21 years and the full potential of the building in this new role is slowly being
realised.
When the mill ceased production, the water wheel and machinery were removed but
the mill race remained, the narrow concrete channel beneath the building which
harnesses the river flow controlled by a small sluice gate, and it is here that
the new wheel is being installed to produce electricity. Jim and dedicated
helper, Doug Fownes, aged 66, a retired production engineer, have spent more
than 400 hours on the installation using equipment and parts made locally.
Technical advice has been forthcoming from the Pedley Wheel Trust at Adlington,
near Macclesfield in Cheshire, which has its own home made overshot waterwheel
generating domestic electricity while the Rotary Club of Bourne promised
financial backing for the £7,000 project.
The new wheel is 11.5 feet (3.5 metres) in diameter and fitted with forty steel
paddles coated with red oxide paint while the spokes are made from water
resistant iroko, a light coloured hardwood from Africa that had been chosen for
the project for its strength and durability and all of the sections had been
specially varnished to repel moisture. A £2,000 gearbox and generator have been
connected to capture the energy from the wheel and when working at full
capacity, it gives 140 revolutions per minute driving the 1.5 kW generator, thus producing
36 kilowatt hours (kWh) every day and 13,140 kWh each year, firstly to power the lights in
the mill and later as an input into the national grid for a financial return at
a variable rate of between 10p and 15p per kWh, so reducing the annual
electricity bills.
Final tests are now being carried out on the equipment and after the trial runs
now underway, the official opening will take place at noon on Saturday 24th May
when the project will be declared open by Canon David Staples, president of the
Rotary Club of Bourne.
Like him or loathe him, Boris Johnson, the new Mayor of London, has
started his job this week with at least one bright idea by scrapping The
Londoner, the free newspaper distributed monthly by the Greater London Authority
to three million homes, which has already cost the authority £2.9 million.
Instead, some of the money, about £1 million a year, is to be spent on planting
trees in the deprived areas of the capital.
As a journalist, he realises that local authorities are in the business of
providing public services and not publishing newspapers which is a commercial
undertaking and not one that converts easily into the dissemination of adulatory
offerings singing the praises of a council that may well be lacking in the
expertise it espouses.
Lincolnshire County Council please note. This authority publishes a similarly
worthless newspaper full of propaganda about its activities and presenting them
in a rosy glow of efficiency despite being rated as one of the worst performing
authorities in the country last year. This column has been saying for the past
five years that its free sheet, County News, sent out each month to 320,000
homes, is too expensive to produce, costing council tax payers £5,000 a week,
and although a working group has been appointed to consider its future, we have
heard nothing of its progress. Perhaps members might wish to take the lead from
Boris and ditch it now because as with The Londoner, most people dump it
straight into their silver wheelie bin or use it to line the bottom of the
birdcage.
The urban fox has arrived in Bourne, a fact that I can attest having seen
one with my own eyes. Not that these animals have been very far anyway because
they can be found in large numbers in Bourne Wood and roaming the thousands of
acres of farmland which surround the town but very few people have actually
encountered one in the street.
Driving home along Stephenson Way shortly before midday this week we saw the
unmistakable sight of reynard dashing out of a front garden, having got there
down the side passage, and then into the road ahead of us, disappearing down a
cul-de-sac opposite and into another garden. He did not hang about but
identification was not difficult, beautifully russet coloured, sleek and
nimble-footed and cunningly aware of what was going on around him even in broad
daylight.
Foxes in the neighbourhood are not, of course, a new phenomenon, because in the
pre-wheelie bin days when rubbish was left in the side passage packed into black
plastic bags they frequently ripped them open in search of tasty morsels but
this was a strictly nocturnal activity and we were only aware of the culprit by
the muddy paw marks left when the weather was wet. In addition, I see them
frequently from my study window overlooking the fen, usually loping across the
cornfields on their way home after a night out, but this is the first time I
have actually spotted one in the street. Yet even this is not unique in Bourne
because in January 1972, a fox appeared in the Market Place at 11.30 a m and was
caught in the bus waiting room beneath the Town Hall, a reminder that the
countryside was still not far away.
We will most certainly be seeing more of them in the future. Foxes make a
success of living alongside people, adapting to their habits and feeding off
what they can scavenge from their leftovers. They are now a familiar sight in
many neighbourhoods and it is estimated that 30,000 of them have moved into town
and cities with one even being spotted in Downing Street. In fact, some experts
reckon that there are more living in our urban areas than there are in the wild,
becoming more common than stray cats, and unlike rats, which appear to be
abhorrent to everyone, most people seem delighted to have them. So be on the
lookout because the fox is here to stay.
Message from abroad: We have had a near record snowfall which started in
November, zapping us with three heavy storms and almost snowing every day. The
last big one was in 1971 when we had about 14 feet of the stuff. We thought that
might be bettered but it failed by about four inches. Luckily we did not get
very many severe below zero days but snow-shovellers were getting quite sick of
the job, many having to clear it off flat roofs, including ours, and some
collapsed. Our streets were all one track and sidewalks were non-existent at the
end of the snowfall. We were lucky to have our big snow-blower so managed to
keep us opened up very well all winter. The whole territory looked like a war
zone with trenches everywhere through the snow. Now we are waiting for the water
from the snow melt of the northern parts of Ontario and Quebec to enter the
Ottawa River which is the watershed for the north and empties into the St.
Lawrence at Montreal. It generally peaks in early June when we may expect some
flooding in low areas along the river. The snow around the houses here did not
cause any flooding. Usually the ground in winter is frozen to a depth of about
four feet but the snow before it froze up kept the ground insulated and the run
off sank right into the ground. And would you believe it? Our lawn is now ready
for its first mowing. There is no such thing as spring here! Memo to grandfather
Flatters in heaven: Tell me again, grandfather, why did you leave Bourne to come
to Canada? Did you not check out the weather before sailing? - email from
Ethel Guertin, aged 90, of Quebec, Canada, grand-daughter of Joseph Tye Flatters
(1841-85), photographer, Abbey Church bell ringer and trumpet player with Bourne
Town Band, who emigrated to Canada with his wife and three young children in
1871, Saturday 10th May 2008.
Thought for the week: There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland
scenery that enters into the soul and delights and elevates it and fills it with
noble inclinations. - Washington Irving, American author and the country's
first man of letters, best known for his short stories The Legend of Sleepy
Hollow and Rip Van Winkle (1783-1859).
Saturday 24th May 2008
Economic restraint is again signalling drastic cuts in our public services, this time
one that has been with us for almost a century with a decision by British
Telecom to phase out the remaining payphones in the streets around Bourne. The
last two, in Churchill Avenue and Northfields, will soon be gone, following the
disappearance of others at various locations from November 2004 when their death
knell first sounded, although two in the town centre which are used regularly
will remain.
Although these plain Perspex boxes have become a familiar sight they are poor
replacements for the red-painted cast iron kiosks introduced early in the last
century and which were soon so popular and useful that they became one of the
instantly recognisable symbols of Britain but in the past 30 years most have
been replaced. Ironically, one or two of the red telephone kiosks of yesteryear,
designed by the architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott to commemorate the Silver
Jubilee of King George V in May 1935, can still be seen around Bourne having
been bought by private individuals as garden ornaments when they were phased
out. In addition, 15,000 of them, perhaps more, remain in use at heritage sites
and elsewhere while a further 1,000 kiosks were identified as being of special
architectural and historical interest, mainly because they were near existing
listed buildings or in attractive town and country locations.
We take the telephone for granted today and not only do most homes have one but
millions of people also carry a mobile in their pocket or handbag. The ubiquity
of this communications facility has become part of our way of life but it was
not always so. During my boyhood in the 1930s, most people depended on the
public call box, sometimes a mile or more away, to summon the doctor or the fire
brigade in times of emergency, or to make that important call for business or
domestic reasons. The sight of someone huddled inside with a pile of pennies and
a bundle of documents while others waited impatiently outside for their turn was
a common one and lengthy queues often built up to use what was probably the only
telephone in the locality. But from 1980, the kiosk evolved into the payphone
and now that too has become redundant although repeated vandalism and the
soaring cost of maintenance has played its part in their exit from the street
scene.
Today, most people, even children, have a mobile which is so often stuck to the
side of their heads like an enormous earring. It has become part of daily life,
often as a useless novelty, and who has not been irritated by someone using one
in the supermarket queue, in shops, on the train or bus, in the bank or the pub,
loudly declaiming their private affairs to everyone around and totally oblivious
of their unwelcome contribution to the urban noise level. But what is it that
they must hear or say that cannot wait until tomorrow or at least until they get
home? The red kiosks were a sound-proof haven of privacy, a memory of a bygone
age, whereas the mobile has become a noisy symbol of progress. The payphone
bridged the gap between the two and now that too is deemed to have outlived its
usefulness.
Those to be axed are among a total of 72 which will be removed across
South Kesteven because according to BT figures they have declined in usage
following the introduction of mobile phones, making 60% unprofitable with most
being used for less than one call a month. In times past, these figures would
have been ignored in the interests of maintaining a public service but today,
financial considerations dictate all policy decisions and so they must go,
irrespective of the fact that they always seem busy and still provide a lifeline
for old people and those who cannot afford the luxury of a mobile and therefore
have no other means of communication with the outside world, especially in the
evenings and weekends. But this is the current trend in the provision of public
services, no matter how useful or necessary, where the profit motive influences
all decisions and unless they make money then the axe is inevitable.
Guerrilla gardening may be coming to Bourne with the tacit approval of
the authorities to plant flowers in the neglected tubs scattered around the town
centre. The ten containers were installed in the summer of 2000 in an attempt by
the Town Centre Management Partnership to brighten up the streets and although
they have been well tended by a squad from the Social Education Centre, the work
has fallen behind in recent weeks and as a result they have become receptacles
for cigarette stubs and other unwanted detritus.
The tubs are to be replaced soon by new ones designed to complement other street
furniture in the town centre such as the bench seats and larger planters in
readiness for the East Midlands in Bloom competition due to take place this
summer, together with a three-tier planter outside the Town Hall. But until this
happens, there is sufficient scope for itinerant green fingers to add their own
touch by popping the odd geranium or half dozen pansies left over from their own
herbaceous borders, pots or patios into the soil when passing and hope they will
thrive and flower to bring a touch of colour for shoppers in the coming weeks.
The practice of guerrilla gardening began in the London area as a war against
the neglect of public spaces by local authorities such as roundabouts and grass
verges and is often carried out surreptitiously, even at night, because councils
particularly dislike any infringements of their powers, even when the results
mean an improvement to the environment. Those engaged in these secretive
horticultural pursuits include young people and pensioners, businessmen and
housewives, anyone in fact who prefers to see a well tended plot rather than an
urban eyesore and many suburbs have benefited as a result, particularly Kensal
Green, Southwark, Elephant and Castle, Hackney, Brockley and even Westminster,
with flowers and shrubs now growing where once there were weeds and scrub.
Successful sorties have even been celebrated on completion with a party and the
capital city looks the better for it.
Perhaps the suggestion that our town centre tubs be similarly tended might
spread to other areas of Bourne that are being neglected by those in charge and
I can think of several places that enthusiastic gardeners could tackle for the
benefit of the community. Specific eyesores include the lane between Church Walk
and South Street where the verge between the path and the wall is overgrown and
attracts a variety of discarded rubbish, the footpath alongside Baldock’s Mill
from South Street, a favourite route for anyone on their way to the Wellhead
Gardens but seriously neglected and even hazardous underfoot, especially on wet
days, the edges of the car park adjoining the old Budgens supermarket which have
rarely been maintained since it opened in 1989, and the western end of Wherry’s
Lane, one of the town’s most disgraceful black spots that has been continually
ignored for the past ten years. There are many others, enough to keep a
dedicated group of guerrilla gardeners busy for the coming summer and so help
this town win yet another award in the East Midlands in Bloom competition when
the judges arrive in July.
What the local newspapers are saying: Criminal damage is always an
unhappy occurrence to report because it is a sad commentary on society but the
consequences are particularly depressing when it undermines voluntary effort. A
front page report in The Local is devoted to an arson attack on a storage
building in the recreation ground containing soccer equipment belonging to
Bourne Town Juniors, one of our most active youth organisations and one that
provides a basic grounding for boys and girls in the nation’s most popular sport
(May 23rd). The blaze broke out around 4 am on Thursday morning with flames and
plumes of thick black smoke pouring from the roof and an hour later the building
was gutted. The valuable equipment inside was reduced to ashes and police
investigating the fire say that it appears to have been started deliberately.
The club, which is run entirely by volunteers, caters for more than 260 children
in 20 teams and as the equipment was needed for a regional tournament due to be
held this weekend, officials are now desperately trying to find replacements to
ensure that the event goes ahead as planned. After that, they face another round
of fund-raising to make up the losses worth more than £2,500, including six new
goalposts bought last year after David Dodds, manager of the under-eights,
raised the money to buy them from sponsors by running in the London marathon.
The Local also reports that Bourne Town Council has cancelled next
Tuesday’s meeting of the amenities committee because members have nothing to
discuss (May 23rd). The newspaper says there is a lack of items for the agenda
which will come as a surprise to many who think that the authority is a hotbed
of debate to keep our local affairs in order but this is obviously not the
case. Bourne Preservation Society has every reason to be miffed about this
inactivity because members are anxiously awaiting a reply to their dossier on
the future management and use of the cemetery chapel which was handed in on
April 22nd but have been told that the council is so busy that a decision cannot
be made until the end of next month. Indeed, the wheels of bureaucracy do seem
to be turning so exceedingly slow that it is a wonder anything actually gets
done. Perhaps the cancelled meeting could be reconvened to consider this issue and so
please everyone all round.
The rumour that the pop singer Leo Sayer once worked in Bourne persists
despite being laid to rest by this column many years ago. The story goes that he
was once employed as an assistant at D J Spire's electrical shop in the town
centre, now occupied by a travel agency, and since then there have been regular
messages on the Bourne Forum from people who claimed to have seen him there
behind the counter. There were also suggestions that a plaque should be erected
on the front of the shop saying: "Leo Sayer once worked here".
I spent a great deal of time checking out the tale but could not find any
supportive evidence and so in May 2001 I issued an appeal on this web site and
this produced a reply from the man himself because Leo emailed to put the record
straight. He said that he knew Bourne because he had visited the area a long
time ago but he added: "I really must clear up this rumour once and for all
about my career there as an electrician. It is simply just not true. I spent
most of my early years on the south coast of England and in London where I
worked as a graphic designer. I cannot imagine the havoc I would have caused as
an electrician for although I am technically minded, my experience only helps me
run my studio or fiddle with my computers. As to working in a shop, well, let's
just say musicians or artists are not the most practical of people. I don't know
how this rumour started and I've tried to scotch it before, but you know how
creatively people's minds can work."
Leo finished his message by saying: "Congratulations on a great web site about a
lovely place. I wish the people of Bourne happiness, tranquillity and freedom
from the threat of visiting pop stars!" Despite this categorical denial, I have
no doubt that the story will surface again at some time in the future because as
with all urban myths, they are difficult to displace from the subconscious once
they have taken hold.
Thought for the week: What is this life if, full of care, we have no time
to stand and stare. - William Henry Davies or W H Davies, Welsh poet and
writer who lived for a spell as a tramp in England and the United States
(1871-1940).
Saturday 31st May 2008
The new hedge on the Abbey Lawn - see "There have been
complaints . . . "
A planning wrangle over The Croft in North Road which has
been with us for more than fifteen years might soon be over with the
announcement that the developers are now considering using the house for a
complex of retirement homes. The suggestion has been welcomed by local
councillors and could well be the solution to a controversy that has provoked
heated debate since it began in 1993.
Meadowland around the once imposing house, built in 1922, is earmarked for
residential development but repeated applications to erect houses on the
seven-acre site have been refused and there has been deadlock between the owners
and South Kesteven District Council since the last one was rejected by a public
inquiry in December 2005.
The property has been neglected ever since and although those living nearby,
especially in North Road and Maple Gardens, have no wish for a new estate to be
built on their doorstep, they have been witnessing the alternative with a once
grand house and grounds being slowly reduced to an overgrown and derelict plot.
Compromise was the obvious answer and this now appears to be on the cards
because the owners told the Stamford Mercury that they envisaged “a
retirement village” for the site which would probably mean the main house being
converted into flats with other units, perhaps bungalows, in the grounds (May
23rd).
Retirement homes have been around for many years and are now being built in
Bourne in large numbers, an acknowledgement of the current economic situation in
which young people can no longer afford to buy whereas retired people can,
perhaps because the taxation policies of successive governments coupled with a
financial prudence largely unknown today, means that they are probably the last
generation to have the necessary capital. The result is substantial new
developments in Manning Road, South Street and South Road, all blocks of flats
specially designed for the older generation anxious to move into smaller and
more compact accommodation, sometimes with care supervision. This is usually
achieved by selling their existing home to release the required equity but it is
not an arrangement that will suit everyone because the new properties are
usually leasehold with the requirement of a monthly service charge that can be
as high as £250 a month and so the differential surplus in swapping is soon
eroded.
Negotiations for The Croft site are still at an early stage and there is talk of
providing affordable housing which invariably means smaller units and more of
them, normally provided by housing associations for the younger and less well
off, and it is doubtful if this type of accommodation will be made available for
the elderly. Any planning application therefore will need to be scrutinised by
our councillors with extreme care.
There have been complaints about a new evergreen hedge
springing up across the Abbey Lawn from people who either use this open space or
live in the vicinity of the grounds that it might create a safety hazard once it
grows to its full height of six feet. The problem, according to one pensioner,
Mrs Freda Howarth, aged 66, is that it will provide shelter for intruders up to
no good, especially at night. “I will not walk through there after dark”, she
told The Local newspaper. “I would feel quite unsafe”. (May 23rd).
This could be written off as unfounded fears of the elderly but then Mrs Howarth
is a Bourne resident and is entitled to have her say and on this occasion she is
supported by Mrs Mandy Delaine-Smith who is also chairman of the Bourne Outdoor
Pool Preservation Trust which administers the lido on the edge of the Abbey
Lawn. She told the newspaper: “We are greatly concerned about the safety of our
pool users and the public who cross the grounds when this hedge grows. It may
become an unsafe place and the beauty of this open space will be spoiled. The
trust is greatly disappointed with the planting of this hedge without any prior
consultation, especially in view of the detrimental effect it will have on the
business of the pool in future years by concealing the entrance.”
The laurel hedge has been erected by Bourne Football Club whose pitch and
headquarters are situated at the Abbey Lawn. President Terry Bates explained
that the club is required by the Football Association to enclose their ground
and after deciding that a hedge would be the best way to do this, BUC gave
permission for them to go ahead. “We are governed by the FA in terms of facility
standards and as far as I am aware, the situation is realistic”, he said.
The problem therefore appears to be the lack of public consultation because this
is the first time that the hedge has ever been mentioned by the newspapers and
its planting appears to be yet another decision made by the trustees of Bourne
United Charities in the privacy of the boardroom at the Red Hall without telling
anyone what they are up to. Plans are already in hand to fence off the Abbey
Lawn to deter intruders and crack down on drinking, vandalism and other
anti-social behaviour, but this decision was also taken in secret by BUC and
unknown to the town until revealed by this column.
Many wonder, therefore, if other changes are in the pipeline that will affect
the Abbey Lawn. What, for instance, will happen to the right of way that crosses
the land and is subject to the Countryside Rights of Way Act 2000? Permission
would be needed from Lincolnshire County Council to change or close it because
rights of way are ancient privileges that are not easily given up and either
extinguishing or diverting them is likely to attract the attention of
conservation organisations, not least the Ramblers’ Association, and even result
in a public inquiry.
It is therefore disturbing that a contributor to the Bourne Forum who appears to
be closely connected with the club should take exception to the concerns of Mrs
Howarth because he claims that the Abbey Lawn will become a no go area after
dark and anyone walking there would be trespassers. He adds: “When all said and
done, the charities (BUC) agreed this being done so it’s no good complaining
now.”
If the people had known of this development and given the chance to air their
views, these concerns could have been addressed but to present the hedge as a
fait accompli with no possible recourse is an alienation of goodwill, especially
as the football club only shares the Abbey Lawn with other sports organisations
and the general public and so any decisions about its future affect us all. The other point that should be
remembered is that when this land was purchased in 1932 at the instigation of a
far-seeing clerk, Horace Stanton (1897-1977), it was quite clearly stated that
it would be “preserved as an open space for ever”, a statement of intent that
appears on one of the main gateposts. Any infringements of that declaration by
previous trustees need to be questioned, especially if they are arrived at
behind closed doors and without the public being informed.
The football club has every right to protect its ground and a hedge would appear
to be a satisfactory way to do it. But the Abbey Lawn is a community facility
and therefore the people ought to have been asked their views, particularly the
trustees of the outdoor pool which is also a tenant. It should then be a lesson
learned by BUC for the future.
There is optimistic though not necessarily reassuring news that South
Kesteven District Council favours an eastern route for any north-south bypass
for the town, thus pouring cold water on the scheme by Larkfleet Homes to slice
it through Bourne Wood, a proposal that has been condemned by dedicated
conservationists and all who love this amenity. Jeff Clarke, from the
authority’s planning policy team, has written to The Local newspaper
saying that the council would not support a road on that side of the town
because there is no need for any large scale housing in that area (May 16th).
Unfortunately, all of this takes us well into the future and embraces the
provisions of the Local Development Framework (LDF) which will guide the form
and location of new development until 2026. Nevertheless, current thinking from
this quarter lends no support for development to the north west and instead
favours the eastern side of Bourne, recently condemned by Larkfleet because a
bypass in this direction would be far more costly at twice the length and would
also face difficult technical issues because it would pass through a flood zone.
Although the statement from Mr Clarke is welcome, it is by no means written in
stone and the Friends of Bourne Wood, the conservation organisation that has
mounted a vigorous opposition to losing even a single tree, points out
cautiously that we have heard this before. Similar doubts have been expressed by
town councillor Guy Cudmore (Bourne East) who writes in the Forum that in view
of recent events involving residential development elsewhere in the town, we
should be very worried about the possibility of a western route with associated
houses going ahead at some time in the future.
Indeed, as with all offers of private funding for projects associated with the
large scale building of new homes, in the present financial climate there cannot
be one without the other, as has already been proven in Bourne with the building
of the south-west relief road which opened in October 2005 as part of the
planning gain for the Elsea Park estate. It is the developers who call the tune,
not the councils, and so it will be when, and not if, a new north-south bypass
is built.
At the risk of invoking the wrath of Bourne Chamber of Trade I
must point out that the cloth shopping bags bearing the slogan “Bourne to be
green” which were issued to the public free of charge last month are not quite
up to the job and could have been designed to ensure that they were more user
friendly. In the first place they are too small and take less than the
ubiquitous plastic bags they are meant to replace while the handles are far too
long, making it cumbersome to carry when full, and lastly the linen material
from which they are made is not suitable for a receptacle of this nature, being
much too thin for the purpose.
These conclusions have been reached after many shopping excursions into town as
an accompanying husband and bag carrier and although I persevered, knowing the
good intentions behind their issue, I have finally decided that the plastic bag
is far more useful and always suitable for the job in hand. This is a pity
because the Chamber of Trade had 1,000 of them made with the help of £1,300 in
sponsorship from local firms, the town and district councils, and has gone to
great lengths before handing out 500 of them in the Burghley Centre on Saturday
26th April while the others are still available for anyone who wants one from
various shops in the town centre.
This criticism has nothing to do with the fact that the current disapproval of
plastic bags is based on flawed research although the media coverage has bitten
deep in to the human psyche and will take a great deal of effort to displace.
Issuing these bags to Bourne shoppers has pandered to this modern myth but has
been a harmless exercise, although a spot of consumer research would have been
in order with committee members and their partners trying them out for a week
before handing them out to the public which might have resulted in a better
design. As it is, the operation is likely to be counter productive because
others who have found fault with them are sure to go back to the plastic bags
issued by the supermarkets, despite them being forever tainted by falsehood.
Thought for the week: The measure of a man's real character is what he
would do if he knew he would never be found out. - Thomas Babington Macaulay,
1st Baron Macaulay, English poet, historian and politician and Member of
Parliament for Edinburgh (1800-1859).
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