|
|
June 2001
May was a most eventful month, both personally and for the village or at least certain inhabitants of the village. On a personal note I took delivery of a new computer, which means that I will be able to get back to improving the websites. My son inherited the old one, which is now performing much better since I transferred all of my files from it to the new one. Normal service is now resumed, hopefully.
The A&H Society had a very interesting trip to the Burwell Museum near Cambridge. This amateur setup has achieved amazing things over the years and is well worth a visit. For me as a teacher the old Victorian classroom was a delight. I just couldn't resist sitting in the teacher's chair and threatening the other members with the cane!
The composting issue at the waste tip is still 'smelling' although less so and we suspect that the reduction in offensive odours is more due to less waste being brought in than it is to any new treatment system. The next meeting is scheduled soon and we hope that the County Council will eventually decide to stop sitting on the fence and do something positive about enforcing its decision that the composting operation be shut down. Thanks to Valerie Best for her advice on petitions.
You may remember that the Parish Council had the old tennis court reinstated last year. It is being used a lot and apart from someone taking the net winding handle away with them the court is being well looked after. Unfortunately weeds are growing under the new surface and pushing it up into small mounds. This should not happen so soon, if at all, and the company is being called back to sort the problem under the terms of the guarantee. As Chairman of the Council I find the entire situation exasperating.
The big news is that the Parochial Church Council have been promised grants totally £60 000 towards the £74 000 repair costs of St Mary's Church. If the work is not done then St Mary's is in danger of ending up like St Nicholas - no tower. So the shortfall is £14 000 and the PCC is working incredibly hard to raise it. So far we have seen a car boot sale, a quiz night and, in early July an 'Evening of Song' performed by the Bury St Edmunds "Voice Squad" to be held in the school hall. If you are a local Feltwellian then please try to get along to this evening, I can promise you a rare treat.
I had a wonderful time last Tuesday when John Wilkinson, son of the Rev. Wilkinson, came with his daughter and grandson to visit the Grays at the Old Rectory. John is in his 80s and the thrill that he got from visiting his childhood home cannot be put into words. Suffice it to say that we are all very grateful to Don and Liz for giving up their time. If it hadn't been for the website and the Feltwellian list this visit would never have happened. It is events like this that make all my efforts worthwhile.
You may remember that the website was nominated for a competition. Well it didn't win, but I found out the winner quite by accident the other day. It is the Soham website and it is very good even if the guy running it does work in the computer industry as a website designer! It can be found at Http://www.soham.org.uk
As far as website related matters go I received these three notes in addition to several requests for membership including one from Beijing! Firstly from Chris Cock, "In a conversation with Micheal Banham of Hill St he was telling me that Hill House was used during the war by the RAF to billet airman. Mr Charles Dear (Mike's Brother in law also of Hill St) was watching the film Dial M for Murder, when he recognised the man playing the part of inspector Hubbard was a former RAF serviceman who lived at Hill House during the war. His name was John Williams. He was indeed a fine actor with a long and distinguished career. He died aged 80 in 1983." This second one comes from Robert Walden. "Paul - you're probably aware that the Norfolk census for 1891 is now online. There's no www. in the website address - http://census.pro.gov.uk It can be very slow to open! The third is from Allison, a new village resident," Dear Paul, As a newcomer to Feltwell I was very interested in your website. I've moved into a cottage in Short Beck and my family and I are in the process of trying to "sort it out,
Within a few days of moving in we realised that we were not alone in the cottage, we had someone stopping us from opening and closing our bedroom door, pots of paint have mysteriously 'jumped ' off a table. Footsteps on the stairs and many more incidents that scared my two kids out of their minds. A medium told us that it was a man and that his name began with 'W'. According to our deeds there are many possibilities. We have managed to make peace with him and he now leaves us pretty much alone. He has quite a say in the colours we use to decorate, he soon lets us know if he doesn't like it.
The cottage was previously known as 'Ivy Haven' though we now call it 'Tigh-a-chu' which is Gaelic for 'The Dog House', (we have three). Do you know of any history of our home, I would be very grateful if you would tell me anything you know."
Site 3, Millennium Feltwell, has several new pages added this month and is the one that I will be concentrating on most over the coming months. Sites 1 and 2, the history sites, will be left largely alone except to have links added to Site 3 pages.
That's the plan anyway!
