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Saturday 3rd January 2015
The inability to organise a booze-up in a brewery has become a vulgar euphemism for ineptitude but one that is being quite appropriately bandied around Bourne over the fiasco of emptying our wheelie bins during the Christmas and New Year holiday. The disposal of waste is the most high profile of the public services for which South Kesteven District Council is responsible yet it is unable to keep its commitment to a fortnightly collection of recyclable materials because the scheduled dates clashed with the holiday. Here in Bourne, the fortnightly collection for our silver bins was due on Boxing Day but instead of re-arranging the date as they did for the black bin collection, the council merely cancelled it altogether which means that they were last emptied on Friday 11th December and will not be emptied again until Friday January 9th which is a whole month at a time when paper, glass and other valuable materials that are sent for processing piled up at an alarming rate at households celebrating the festive season, especially those with large families while most have a stream of visitors all generating more. The council appeared to think that this was an acceptable arrangement because they issued us with a few flimsy plastic bags in which we are asked to store the excess waste but leaving those outside to await the arrival of the binmen will most certainly attract birds and cats and perhaps even vermin as well as leaving the garden in a very messy state indeed. A notice also arrived advising us that we could take our rubbish to the local household waste centre, in this case Pinfold Lane, but tell that to the old age pensioners or those without a car and in any case why should we pay for a service through our council tax and then be forced to do it ourselves. Surely such an important local authority has sufficient senior staff with the organisational skills to arrange its holiday schedule in a more efficient manner without taking the first and obvious option by cancelling services altogether, a decision that does not augur well for any real emergency that might arise in the future. It is at times like this that councils forget their legal responsibilities, in this case that of collecting our waste regularly. Once-a-week household rubbish collections were established by law under Disraeli's Public Health Act in 1875 which imposed new standards of sanitation on local authorities in an attempt to stamp out cholera and other diseases spread by contaminated waste which claimed large numbers of lives. Since then, the right of British householders to have their refuse collected at least once a week has been recognised as essential to the nation's health and quality of life although that was quietly forgotten when the wheelie bin system was introduced and now the council cannot even keep to its declared fortnightly system. Rubbish disposal in Bourne has been the responsibility of SKDC since it was formed during the re-organisation of local government in 1974 when the old galvanised dustbins were being used. Various methods have been introduced since then in an attempt to improve the system including black plastic bags followed by green and blue plastic containers for recyclable materials and finally the double wheelie bin system with black for kitchen waste and silver for recyclables which has been with us since 2006, by far the best system in the past hundred years but only if they are emptied regularly. By forcing households to wait for a month is turning the clock back and shifting the inconvenience on to the individual when adequate planning should have dealt with the situation, especially with such a high profile public service. There is one other aspect of this dismal affair and that is the advice of SKDC for householders to use the recycling centre in Pinfold Lane which is not even run by them but by Lincolnshire County Council which slashed opening hours by half two years ago and venturing there on Monday to ease pressure on our own silver bin I faced a lengthy wait because the place was jammed with queues of cars filled with people anxious to get rid of their own Christmas rubbish, a situation that can only get worse this weekend when the silver bins will not have been emptied for three weeks. Coincidentally, the Daily Mail reports (December 19th) that councils across Britain are planning to reduce bin collections to once a month on a permanent basis to save money during the current local authority funding crisis and it is hoped that this holiday fiasco is not a precursor for such an arrangement in Bourne which would do untold damage to the credibility of South Kesteven District Council and question its ability to continue running our public services. The announcement that Lidl is to open a supermarket in Bourne has received an almost rapturous welcome from shoppers, a reception that our existing outlets must envy and it certainly seems that they will have to look to their laurels if they are to maintain their share of the retail market. Lidl Stiftung & Company KG is a German global discount supermarket chain based in Germany with over 10,000 stores across Europe and has grown consistently since launching in the United Kingdom in 1994 with more than 550 stores. Although still a small player in this country with a grocery market share of less than 5%, its importance along with that of continental no-frills competitor Aldi, has begun a retail revolution and is growing in popularity simply because prices are competitive and quality is paramount while many housewives reckon that shopping there saves them 30% or more on their weekly bill over their better known rivals. Frequenting Lidl two or three years ago was thought to be a down market habit but a spell of continually rising prices by the main supermarkets has changed all that and now they are just as busy and there are always many Bourne shoppers to be seen in the nearest store at Stamford who will be looking forward to their own outlet closer to home. Once up and running from their new store in South Road, Lidl’s initiative will undoubtedly have consequences for our shopping habits and existing supermarkets such as Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Co-operative Food are certain to feel the effects, especially in view of their price creep policy over recent months when shoppers have been dismayed to find that the cost of groceries has been rising almost weekly. Competition is essential because it always works in favour of the customer and Lidl’s track record in recent years bodes well for the future because they will either force down prices elsewhere or there are certain to be casualties among those who refuse to change. Sainsbury’s was given a tremendous welcome when their Exeter Street store opened in 1999 and this has become a firm favourite with many but rising prices will drive customers to Lidl and may also wreck their price comparison strategy which currently concentrates on the nearest Asda store which is in Peterborough whereas a true reflection of market trends must be a local store although they are unlikely to choose the cut-price newcomer which would hardly be financially beneficial. Once again a flurry of snow has practically brought the country to a standstill and we wonder how the people coped with the severe falls of past times when towns such as Bourne were actually cut off from the outside world for several days. One of the most serious was a blizzard in 1916 which caused major disruption to public services and left a trail of damage across the district. The wintry conditions prevailed throughout Tuesday 28th March when trees were uprooted in various parts of the town, four on the Abbey Lawn, three in Mill Drove, two near the villas in West Road, three in a field near the railway station at the Red Hall, two at the bottom of Eastgate and one close to Dr John Gilpin's surgery at Brook Lodge in South Street. The telephone and telegraph services were cut off and on Tuesday evening it was reported that not a single telephone subscriber could be reached while the following morning telegrams were not being accepted by the Post Office because they were unable to send them. One telegram sent before noon on the Tuesday was not delivered until 9 o'clock the following morning, an unheard of delay. Rail services were badly disrupted and trains due into Bourne from Saxby just before 11 am on Tuesday were held up by deep snow drifts at South Witham and had still not arrived by midday the following day. The 12.15 pm express to Leicester reached South Witham but was forced to return with its passengers to Norwich. All trains were running late on the Great Northern system and the journey to Grantham took about four hours. A train which left Bourne for Spalding at 3 pm to bring home passengers from Spalding market arrived in Bourne at 7 pm in the evening after the electric signalling system at Twenty failed. The motor mail cart bringing in the morning mail from Peterborough which was usually due at Bourne at 4 am did not arrive until after 7 am on both Tuesday and Wednesday and on the Tuesday run it was held up by telegraph poles that had blown down across the road. The Great War of 1914-18 was in progress and among the passengers stranded at Bourne railway station were three soldiers who were given beds for the night at the Vestry Hall which had been converted for use as a Red Cross hospital for convalescent servicemen. The surprising feature of the storm was that it caused only a small amount of structural damage to property, mainly dislodging slates, tiles and guttering that collapsed under the weight of snow but the town was virtually isolated for several days. Serious snowfalls in recent years have been relatively few although the life of the town was badly disrupted in 1920 and again in 1947 and 1963 while a fall in 1987 saw tractors clearing the town centre. The documentary evidence seems to indicate, however, that people in the past made a more concerted effort to continue with their daily round rather than succumb and take a day off but then it must be remembered that paid leave of absence for whatever reason was virtually unknown until recent times. Urban myths abounded during the wintry weather as pavements were left unswept and many people did not even clear their driveways. On inquiring why not, the popular reply was that it is illegal in case the surface is made unsafe for passers-by such as the postman and newspaper delivery boys and they could be faced with costly claims for compensation if they slipped and injured themselves. Added to this misinformation was the mistaken theory that it was all due to new laws that had been imposed from Europe but again, this is incorrect. As though anticipating the outcry once the snow fell, the government made it quite clear before Christmas that people should ignore spurious health and safety warnings, particular when it meant doing good deeds for neighbours in helping clear ice and snow. Lord Freud, the health and safety minister, told the Daily Mail (December 23rd) that people would not be sued or held responsible if they cleared a path or pavement and then someone fell and injured themselves. “Such bogus excuses give real safety laws a bad name”, he said. The minister was joined in his assurances by Judith Hackitt, chairman of the Health and Safety Executive who said: “Don’t be put off because you are afraid someone will get injured. Remember, people walking on snow and ice have a responsibility to themselves to be careful.” But tales soon spread and so it was after the snowfall that few streets and pavements had been cleared and the majority of driveways left with their covering of white. Let us hope that if we do have a recurrence before the winter is out, this latest piece of folklore will have been buried once and for all because common sense dictates that it is easier and safer to walk on tarmac than two or three inches of snow. Thought for the week: Trying to squash a rumour is like trying to unring a bell. - Shana Alexander (1925-2005), American journalist who became the first woman staff writer and columnist for Life magazine.
Saturday 10th January 2015
A commemorative paving stone to mark the award of the Victoria Cross to local hero Charles Sharpe during the Great War 100 years ago is to be laid in Bourne during the spring. The date Saturday 9th May has been given to South Kesteven District Council by the Department for Communities and Local Government to coincide with the centenary of his award in 1915 while serving with the Lincolnshire Regiment during the Battle of Aubers Ridge in France at the age of 26. Memorial stones are being presented to the home towns of all winners of the Victoria Cross during the war as part of a government scheme to mark the centenary of the outbreak in 2014. The medal is Britain's highest military decoration for gallantry in the field and he was among the 633 members of the armed services who were so honoured. Sharpe’s bravery was recognised by the army after an action near Rouges Bancs, north-east of Neuve Chapelle, when two companies of his battalion reached the German lines after crossing No Man's Land. He was the sole survivor of the initial part of the assault, his commander having been killed and he, as the next senior rank, was in charge with some thirty hand grenade bombs in pouches strapped to his uniform, leading colleagues similarly armed across a muddy, misty battlefield. His men were being shot down one by one as they approached the German trench until he was left standing alone but the bombs he was using were having a deadly effect with the enemy running in all directions trying to escape. He took the fifty-yard trench and was then joined by four other soldiers from another regiment who then attacked the enemy again, tossing their bombs so accurately that they captured another trench, this time measuring some 250 yards. Sharpe returned to England on leave for two months and on 24th July 1915, received his Victoria Cross from King George V at Windsor Castle and then took part in a recruiting drive to urge young, single men to volunteer for military service, visiting many places in Lincolnshire including Spalding and Bourne. From all contemporary accounts, he was one of the most unlikely war heroes, a farm worker fiercely proud of his rural Lincolnshire heritage, totally unpretentious and an utterly unassuming and modest man. On returning to England after winning the VC, he was asked by a journalist to relate the details of his actions but he said simply: "A British soldier will never glorify his own deeds. I only did my duty." Sharpe returned to Bourne after discharge and served for a spell in the Second World War of 1939-45 but died following a fall in 1963, aged 73. The funeral was held at St Nicholas' Church, Lincoln, with full military honours and he was later buried at the city's Newport Cemetery. After his death, his medals and decorations passed to his children who decided to sell them and in 1989 they were sent to Christie's auction rooms in London. In addition to the Victoria Cross, there were eight campaign and commemorative medals. The sale attracted a great deal of attention and press coverage and they went to a surprise bidder for £17,000 who later turned out to be Chris Farmer, treasurer and later Chief Executive, of South Kesteven District Council, who had bought them on behalf of the community to commemorate the centenary year of Sharpe's birth. The medals were cleaned, polished and court-mounted by a specialist firm in Bridlington and wooden plinths were made by craftsmen from the council's own workshops at Grantham to enable them to be put on permanent display. They are now on show with the council's regalia in the chairman's office at the council's headquarters at Grantham, although visitors can see them on request while copies are on display at the Royal Lincolnshire Regiment's museum in Lincoln. The name of Charles Sharpe has also been remembered in Bourne's street names and a small cul-de-sac off Beech Avenue is known today as Sharpe's Close. There were fears that his memorial stone would go to Sleaford which was named in the list published by the government last August but after representations by the council, the leader, Councillor Linda Neal (Bourne West), subsequently received a personal assurance from the minister, Eric Pickles, that the data base was being changed to reflect his home town as Bourne and arrangements are now being made for its installation. One factor has yet to be decided and that is where the stone should be laid and two locations have been suggested, the first close to the War Memorial in South Street and the other outside the newly designed Corn Exchange which is now home to the town’s Community Access Point or CAP. Those interested in the project are currently being contacted by the council and a meeting is expected to be held within the next few weeks when both sites will be visited to determine which is best. This should not be a problem because the original intention by government was to lay the paving stones in the various town centres and in past times this would have been outside the Town Hall but this situation has changed. The building has now been closed after almost 200 years as the centre of civic life and all local authority services transferred to the CAP and the paved market area immediately outside therefore appears to be the perfect and most convenient place for the paving stone to be laid where it would be accessible to everyone at all times and has a far greater footfall than any other place in town. The War Memorial gardens do have an appeal but they are well away from the town centre and administered by Bourne United Charities whose trustees have been known to close the gardens to the public in the past which would not be in keeping with the spirit of the present commemoration. More importantly, the site is more associated with the fallen of past wars whereas Charles Sharpe returned to Bourne and lived a useful life in the town where he had various jobs until a few months before he died. The other factor which weighs in favour of the new market place site is care and maintenance and as the stone is being entrusted to SKDC in the first instance, then it is right that they should be responsible for it in the future, as they have been with his medals. The folly of cancelling the silver wheelie bin collection in the Bourne area over the Christmas holiday was revealed this week as the detritus from four weeks of festivity piled up at the front gates when the refuse lorry finally arrived this week. Come collection day on Friday, the streets of Bourne looked an absolute mess with a wheelie bin outside every house crammed to the lid and many with with assorted bags and boxes stacked around littering the neighbourhood. A snap estimate revealed that most had in fact doubled their usual amount of recyclable waste which was only to be expected in a district where the bins were last emptied on Friday 11th December. The binmen worked flat out to clear the backlog but it was a struggle and in many cases litter fluttered free between bin and truck and was whisked down the street by a high wind. This fiasco arose when South Kesteven District Council realised that the usual fortnightly collection date clashed with Boxing Day but no one appeared to have the organisational skills to arrange an alternative and instead of holding it on the Saturday or another day the following week, it was called off altogether and in doing so, shifted the onus of their inefficiency on to the householders who were issued with flimsy plastic bags in which to pack the excess or told to take it down to the waste recycling centre in Pinfold Lane. Let us hope that the lesson has now been learned. Public services are just that and it is not acceptable for local authorities to cancel them merely because it is the easiest option but to arrange an alternative rather than scrap them altogether. After all, the collection of our wheelie bins is not only the authority’s most high profile service but one financed with the money we pay in council tax and it is therefore incumbent on them to ensure that it is spent for its intended purpose. Christmas has been consigned to the attic for another year. Come Twelfth Night and the task of taking down the decorations and disposing of the tree occupied our morning and soon all traces of the festive season were removed from the house although despite a thorough round of the vacuum cleaner, slivers of gold and silver lametta are bound to lurk at the carpet edges for months to come. The pantry still contained gaily coloured tins and packets of those special bargains which we picked up at Tesco’s in a euphoric spending spree three weeks ago while the silver wheelie bin outside which had not been emptied by the council since early December was filled to overflowing and the flimsy plastic bags issued to take the surplus were also packed to capacity. Christmas may be a season of goodwill but it is also a time of extravagance and unnecessary waste while half the world starves yet we eat our fill and drink to excess without thought of those places around the globe where luxury is a glass of clean water. Perhaps the most wasteful of our habits at this time is the sending of Christmas cards, a tradition that dates back to 1843 when Sir Henry Cole (1808-82), a civil servant, devised and sent the world’s first greetings card at Christmas time and since then the habit has reached astronomical proportions, spawning an entire industry devoted to their design and manufacture while the Royal Mail cashes in annually with a postage of 50p second class with the result that many people now deliver their own by hand although a far more inexpensive alternative is gradually taking hold as more people use the electronic cards that can be sent faster and more cheaply over the Internet. But it is the flimsy paper seasonal salutations bought in the shops in the weeks before Christmas that adorn every home over the holiday, their number an indication of the recipient’s popularity perhaps, although their appeal is fleeting because after a few days they too are consigned to the bin. The futility of this tradition was reflected this week in a massive box parked in the foyer at Sainsbury’s supermarket in Exeter Street marked “Used Christmas cards”. By Tuesday, it was filled to overflowing, the contents spilling out on the floor below, many probably bought at this very store but now having served their purpose are destined for recycling, only to be turned into new paper to make more greetings cards for next year. Unfortunately, it is not something we can really complain about because we are all contributing to one of Britain’s flourishing industries with £1.29 billion spent annually on single cards during 2014, more than all the tea and coffee put together. In fact, more cards are bought per person in the United Kingdom than in any other country which averages 31 per person with an astonishing 884 million single greeting cards being bought from retailers in 2013. These figures issued by the Greeting Card Association indicate that the industry is directly and indirectly responsible for the jobs of 100,000 people in the country including publishers, artists, photographers, verse and prose writers, printers, paper and envelope suppliers and retailers. It is a creative industry with strong bases in London, Nottinghamshire and the north, especially Yorkshire and Lancashire, where it has replaced many of the heavy manufacturing industries as major employers. In addition, charities estimate that £50m is raised for good causes through the sales of charity Christmas cards each year. In view of this mass of evidence in favour of the Christmas card, perhaps I should be sorry that I spoke and if we have bought and mailed so many then we only have ourselves to blame. Thought for the week: British households planned to spend an average of £821 on Christmas in 2014, £604 on gifts, £174 on food and drink and £43 on cards, trees and decorations, bringing the total for the United Kingdom to around £22.5 billion. - report by YouGov, the international Internet-based market research firm, December 2014.
Saturday 17th January 2015
The shipping container which has been parked in a corner of the new market place in Bourne for almost three years looks like becoming a permanent fixture. This unsightly addition is one of the unexpected consequences of establishing the new Community Access Point at the Corn Exchange at a cost of £600,000 and has been parked against the back wall of the Grade II listed Town Hall, thus creating an eyesore which has been with us since work began in March 2012. There were originally two containers, now reduced to one, which is used to store the stalls and canopies for the Thursday and Saturday markets, formerly kept in a storeroom at the Corn Exchange which disappeared as part of the conversion along with the caretaker’s flat. A new space was obviously needed to accommodate this equipment when the plans were drawn up but appears to have been overlooked in the main complex and so planners at South Kesteven District Council came up with the idea of shipping-style containers which may have been suitable as a temporary measure but not a permanent solution and is now creating a most unpleasant sight on the very edge of the town’s Conservation Area. But even this one solitary metal box, now showing signs of wear, remains a blemish on the townscape and a reminder that space was always going to be a problem when the CAP opened in March 2013. Many visitors to the market can be heard remarking on it, some even thinking that it was a portable loo for the workmen left there by mistake, although when its doors open on Thursday and Saturday afternoons its intended purpose is revealed as workmen stack away the stalls for another day. Whether the council is actively seeking a more permanent place to store this equipment or if it is intended to leave the container there in perpetuity remains a mystery. But it is causing concern for property owners in the vicinity, one even claiming that it may be sited illegally on land which he leases for parking purposes but is now unable to do so while its use on market days is creating an unacceptable noise level close to his flat as the equipment is stacked and stored. It was originally thought that the container was a temporary installation in the market place and the records indicate that SKDC did not need planning permission to park it there because it was classed as a small ancillary building connected with work on the Corn Exchange conversion but that project was completed many months ago and so the original reason would no longer appear to be valid. Now, following complaints about the nuisance, officers have tried to find another location without reducing the current number of parking bays available for public use but this has been unsuccessful. The council may be intending to leave the container where it is for the time being which will be most unfortunate for the continuing appearance of the market place as the tourist season approaches. It also reflects earlier fears that the Corn Exchange was not large enough to take all of the services now crammed into it, particularly the public library that has been drastically reduced in size, and now a store for the stalls, while in the meantime the market place must suffer this distinctly unattractive indignity week after week. But one thing is certain. If it had been placed on his property for storage purposes by a private citizen, he would have been issued with an enforcement order to move it long ago. A silver communion set once used at the old Bourne Hospital in South Road which was salvaged from a rubbish skip has joined the museum display of historic artefacts at the Heritage Centre in South Street. It was presented to the hospital soon after it opened in 1915 for use by visiting priests to give communion to sick and dying patients and was used regularly in the wards for the next eighty years. The travelling communion set is contained in a fitted leather case and consists of two silver-mounted decanters for wine and water, a silver chalice and paten for the wafers, two brass candlesticks and a cross, and made by Watt and Co of London and bearing the hallmark for 1898. The hospital closed in September 1998 despite a vigorous public campaign to keep it open and the manager appointed to oversee the closure was Mrs Patricia Friend who worked from Stamford Hospital where she had begun her nursing career as a cadet in 1954, subsequently qualifying as a State Registered Nurse and then becoming senior nursing officer. Although a great deal of furniture and equipment was salvaged for use in other hospital units elsewhere, most was thrown away including the leather-cased communion set which she recognised for its historic value and took it home for safe-keeping. The hospital buildings were left standing empty for the next five years until early in 2003 when the four-acre site was sold for residential development and bulldozers moved in to demolish the complex which disappeared within a few weeks and has now been replaced by new houses. Mrs Friend died on October 2013, aged 73, after a nursing career spanning 55 years which she spent at the Stamford Hospital. Her husband, Charles, a retired charity executive, aged 77, and now living at Morton, near Bourne, decided that the communion set should be preserved and passed it on to the Rev David Creasey, associate priest at Morton, and he in turn handed it over to Father Christopher Atkinson, Vicar of Bourne, who carried out some research into its provenance. “It would have been known as a sick communion set to enable the clergy take holy communion to those who are housebound or in hospital”, he said. “I suspect that it may have been given to the hospital by a retiring priest in order that his successor could carry on the work, perhaps the Vicar of Bourne at that time or even one of his curates but one thing is certain. It has certainly seen a lot of use over the years.” Father Chris has now handed over the communion set to the Civic Society where it has been put on display at the Heritage Centre. “The whole set and leather case have cleaned up remarkably well”, said society committee member Jim Jones who organises the various collections. “Not only is it an unusual and attractive item from our history but one that is already becoming a talking point among visitors.” The dramatic changes in our public houses over the centuries may be judged by an incident at one of them almost 200 years ago which ended in a disturbance in which a man was stabbed but it also gives us an insight into the problems of providing accommodation at busy times. Stow Green Fair was being held that week at the hamlet a mile to the east of Folkingham, an annual market, horse and pleasure fair that attracted every scoundrel in the district on the lookout for easy pickings while drunkenness, fighting and disorderly conduct were a regular occurrence. As so many people attended the event, overnight accommodation was booked up at most of the inns and public houses in the neighbourhood and Bourne always took its fair share of visitors, sleeping them where they could, with half a dozen or more to a room and often with several sharing the same bed. Such it was on the night on Monday 1st July 1833 when the Red Lion in South Street was packed with people on their way to the fair which was due to start the following day. The bars too were doing brisk business and among the customers was John Dawson, an engraver and copper-plate printer, from Stamford. During the evening, he fell in with a number of rowdy showmen and having drunk too much, was put to bed in one of the rooms upstairs in a state of intoxication. There were four beds in the room and he was given one of them, the others being occupied by three married couples and what happened next was subsequently described by the Stamford Mercury in graphic detail. “The wife of one of the men”, said their report, “was alarmed by Dawson putting his hand into her bed and she awoke her husband who aroused the other parties in the room. A scuffle took place to turn Dawson out and in the course of the affray the offender stabbed one of the men with a knife which fortunately striking on the ribs did no very serious injury, the point of the weapon being turned by the blow.” In the confusion that followed, Dawson managed to escape but was apprehended the following morning and brought before the magistrates at the Town Hall where he was committed to the Folkingham jail to await a further hearing the next day when he was charged with wounding a showman with a knife with intent to do him bodily harm. But after hearing the evidence, the magistrates decided that the case had not been proved and the prisoner was discharged on payment of £2 7s. costs, a fortuitous verdict because during the hearing Dawson had been revealed as a man with responsibilities, having a wife and five children back home in Stamford, and had he been found guilty the sentence would have been a lengthy jail sentence or even transportation to the colonies. The future of our traditional public houses is still very much a matter of speculation as business continues to be precarious with landlords facing rising costs just to keep going and recent years have brought so much insecurity in the licensed trade that more hostelries have changed hands than at any other time in our history. Bourne has never been short of pubs and there were fourteen in business by the end of the century when the population was a mere 4,300 (1901 census) but since then, there has been a fluctuating pattern of closures and openings with the most dramatic developments occurring during the final years of the 20th century when the appearance of the traditional public house began to change. As a result, they bear little resemblance today to those of past times as they try to keep pace with changing public tastes and as a result the spit and sawdust bars of yesteryear have long since gone to be replaced with comfortable lounges where parents can even take their children and the serving of food is an essential ingredient. The new bars in North Street such as Smith’s and the Jubilee have caught the mood of change while others such as the old established Marquess of Granby in Abbey Road and the Royal Oak in North Street have been unable to compete and closed their doors although the buildings are now in other useful occupation. Now the Golden Lion in West Street is undergoing a facelift to keep pace with its competitors. There has been a public house here since the early 19th century although the property probably began life as four artisans’ cottages, one becoming a beer house and then the entire row was converted into a tavern which opened in 1844 with a celebration pigeon shoot and dinner. The building has since been considerably extended to become a popular town centre hostelry and is now Grade II listed as being of architectural importance. The recent owners were Samuel Smith, the oldest brewery in Yorkshire, which planned to modernise the property but in October last year decided to sell it instead to a private buyer who is currently refurbishing the premises in readiness for a reopening later this year. Despite changing times therefore, Bourne appears to be keeping abreast with its public houses and there are now twelve in the parish area, which includes the Wishing Well at Dyke, although all have to open longer hours than in the past and even provide meals and entertainment to ensure that they keep and expand their customer base. Public demand has meant that the licensed trade has become extremely competitive and financially fraught but the signs are that our landlords are meeting the challenge. Thought for the week: I rose politely in the club and said: "I feel a little bored. Will someone take me to a pub?" - Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936), English poet, philosopher, dramatist, journalist and orator who often made his points with popular sayings, proverbs and allegories. Saturday 24th January 2015 This is our last Diary entry. The feature has been under review for some months and we have now decided to call a halt. We celebrated a small landmark in November with the 800th edition and realised then that its days were numbered. The diary first appeared on Saturday 28th November 1998 when it replaced the news section which began when the web site was launched the previous August. So many people from at home and abroad were visiting the web site and asking questions about what was going on in the town that I decided to contribute a weekly commentary giving a personal reflection on issues and events, and resisting my wife's suggestion to call it An Old Codger Writes, decided that it should be known simply as The Bourne Diary. Apart from odd weeks when we were away, it has been published continuously ever since, always averaging 2,000 words, a total of more than 1½ million which exceeds War and Peace and the Bible put together, a substantial body of work that has created a detailed chronicle embracing much of importance that has been happening in Bourne over the past sixteen years. The Diary soon became one of our best read features, discussing subjects of topical and historic interest relating to Bourne and although I always strove to be fair and not to give undue offence, my opinions on occasions did not endear me to some people in the town even though I preferred to be read with humour and understanding rather than outrage. But sixty or more years as a journalist have taught me that whatever you say will not please everyone and there will always be those who regard differing views as a criticism of themselves whereas an open and inquiring mind is intellectually more stimulating. The Diary may only have been a small voice in Bourne but the evidence is that we were being read and even influencing opinion and events. Our watchword has always been common sense, a reflection of what the man in the street was thinking rather than what was being decided by those who run our affairs because the gulf between the two appears to widen with the years rather than establishing the common ground of a Utopian world. Perhaps a Diary without controversy might be welcomed in some quarters but sycophancy is not my style and it would also demonstrate that dissent was dead whereas anyone with a finger on the public pulse will know that there is still immense discontent about how our money is being spent and what is being done in our name. We do not live in an ideal world but the Internet has given the people a new voice that is both loud and immediate and is therefore being heard clearer than ever before and those who choose to ignore it do so at their peril. However, changing habits on the Internet with the rapid growth of social media has reduced our readership and so I decided that this was the time to end it. During the past seventeen years I have also amassed a large collection of photographs of Bourne and I am now bringing them together as the Bourne Picture Archive in conjunction with the OS Geograph Britain project to which I contribute making it the most comprehensive photographic survey of town and district ever undertaken. Bourne has been recorded through pictures in the past but mainly by professional photographers such as Joseph Flatters, William Redshaw, Richard Bertolle and Ashby Swift, and although the bulk of their work has been lost, many photographs have survived to illustrate what the town was like in the late 19th and early 20th centuries although apart from an odd exception all of these are in black and white. A large number of these now form part of A Portrait of Bourne (on CD-ROM), the definitive history of the town which I have been writing for the past fifteen years and now includes two million words of text and some 6,000 archive and contemporary photographs. This will now be supplemented by the Bourne Picture Archive and although I am a journalist who takes pictures rather than a photographer, modern technology has enabled me capture an entire collection of images reflecting the town and district as it has been in recent years which should be an invaluable aid to future historians. There are already 160 photographs on site and may be accessed through the front page of the web site but there is still a large quantity in my collection to check through and so a substantial number will be added in the future. Most importantly, the archive is now available to any organisation or individual who wishes to download and use one or more of the images together with their descriptive captions for teaching purposes, web site construction or illustration, provided the copyright conditions outlined on site are met. We therefore remain active and although there will be no Diary, the web site will remain for the time being and will be regularly updated with articles and photographs while the new Bourne Picture Archive will continue to grow and so please keep logging on.
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