LOCAL PEOPLE are showing their support for Ukraine and its refugees following last week’s Russian invasion.
A lorry-load of warm clothing and baby supplies left Hazlemere at the weekend bound for the Polish border with Ukraine where the goods will be handed to authorities organising the settlement of refugees.
The goods were donated by residents in Hazlemere. Other supply runs are being organised locally and details will appear on this blog.
Bucks Council has been inundated with inquiries from people wanting to help and last night put details on the home page of its website giving details of where people can donate to official appeals organised by the British Red Cross and UNICEF.
Many council buildings are flying the Ukrainian flag this week and others are being lit in the blue and yellow colours of the flag. Wycombe Swan has cancelled a scheduled appearance by the Russian State Ballet between 10 and 12 March because of the invasion.
There are over 2,000 Russian-born people living in Buckinghamshire, the majority of them here in South Bucks. Many, if not all, are said to be appalled by their president’s war.
Russians and Ukrainians here live in harmony – indeed the High Wycombe Russian Society has a thriving membership and its February meeting featured the work of Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko and Ukranian artist Alexander Bogomazov in a talk entitled “Two Sons of Ukraine.” There is not a hint from anyone that Ukraine should be part of Russia or ruled by it.
It’s not all bad news…
TREES TOOK quite a battering in February’s storms. The council cleared over 300 trees that had fallen and blocked roads in this area.
In local woods many hundreds more were downed and land owners and foresters are still checking the safety of trees bordering public pathways.
In fact Penn House Estate said just last night (28 February) that the horse path through Witheridge Wood would remain closed for some time because damage to the wood was more serious than initially thought. They said a number of trees by the path required immediate attention.
On top of that thousands of ash trees have been felled this winter throughout the Chilterns as a result of ash dieback disease. At Chilterns Crematorium 240 have been taken out and over 300 at Hughenden Manor. There’s particular concern at the National Trust’s Ashridge Estate – so named because of its preponderance of ash trees – where hundreds of infected saplings have been uprooted.
It’s not all bad news though. On the dieback front, there’s some encouraging signs that mature ash trees are overcoming the disease. Elsewhere volunteers from various conservation groups have been planting thousands of new trees in the Chilterns, including lots of different species that thrived in the area before beech became dominant.
It’s a project that’s been ongoing for some years and it’s beginning to pay dividends. Different species of trees attract different species of birds and other wildlife. A survey by ornithologists in the Chilterns this winter found 100 different bird species over-wintering here, a figure that continues to grow.
After 60 years at the wicket, David lets the youngsters have a go…
AFTER scoring 12,222 runs, taking 547 wickets and holding onto 307 catches, David Lander has decided to call it a day after 60 years playing for Penn Street Cricket Club. He has been junior player, senior player, captain, groundsman, chairman, junior manager and tour manager in his time and a few years ago the England and Wales Cricket Board presented him with a National Unsung Hero award for his services to the club.
“The injury I received towards the end of last season brought it home that perhaps it was time to leave the playing side to the more-than-able younger guns,” he told the committee.
He is still up though for a session umpiring, playing for Bucks Seniors and ground preparation, fitness permitting. As current club chairwoman Jane Fryer told him: ”What a fantastic innings.”
Smiffy and Swampy. Same school. Same passion. Two very different lives.
DO YOU ever wonder what happened to the people you went to school with?
Did the studious boy good at maths go on to be a multi-millionaire accountant or give it all up and become a pig farmer? Did the rather prim girl at the front of the class go on to be a classical musician or surprise everyone and become a royal marine?
I mention this because recent interviews have featured two former pupils at Holmer Green Senior School who could hardly lead more different lives.
They probably never met – while one was larking about in the first form the other was in the fifth form working part time at The Entertainer toy shop – but it’s certain they were in the assembly hall at the same time or passed in the corridor.
The larking-about first former went on to become a global TV host and comedy actor. The deep thinking fifth former became Britain’s most famous environmental activist.
One, James Corden, is a multi-millionaire and father of three living in a mansion with eight bathrooms, a swimming pool and a grand piano in one of the swishier parts of Los Angles.
The other, Daniel Hooper, aka Swampy, is also a father of three earning money as a forestry worker when not protesting. He lives in a roundhouse made of wood, straw, lime and horse hair in a commune in a remote part of west Wales.
Daniel, 48, has spent much of his life protesting up trees and in tunnels against by-passes, high speed trains and nuclear power stations. He’s been doing it for 25 years and wouldn’t change any of it. “Protest works,” he told The Times magazine. “It’s what changes things.”
James, 43, has spent much of his 25 year career in TV and film studios and now hosts America’s biggest chat show. He first became nationally known portraying Smiffy in the TV comedy Gavin and Stacey. He tells his biographer: “There’s nothing nicer than getting a round of applause for turning up for work.”
Two former local schoolboys who have really made their mark on the world. Both, completely content.
Penn was so utterly Uttley
MY THANKS to Liz Tebbut for the loan of Alison Uttley’s compendium Magic In My Pocket, which contains her short story The Merry-go-Round, based on Penn Fair (and mentioned in our Christmas quiz).
It contains a wonderful description of Penn written in the 1940s. Here’s a couple of paragraphs…
“On the green there is a duck pond, where tiddlers live and water weeds grow. In the winter the children run from their homes and slide on the ice. They haven’t any skates, and such things are not necessary, for they cost money. The children of Penn slide in their little strong boots, or they ride on the pond sitting in wooden boxes from the small grocer’s shop which is also the post office. Some even sit on tea-trays from their mothers’ kitchens. They are wrapped in gay scarves and they shout till their voices ring like the church bells in the cold air.
“In spring they catch each other as they race on the green and run round the trees. In summer they fish for minnows, with bent pins and pieces of string. In autumn they watch the golden leaves fly down from the trees, and they stretch out their hands to grab them. Every autumn leaf caught before it touches the earth brings good luck, as all country folk know.”
Alison Uttley, best known of course for her Little Grey Rabbit books, moved to Thackers in Ellwood Road, Beaconsfield in 1938 and died in 1976 aged 91. She is buried in Penn Churchyard with a gravestone engraved “Spinner of Tales”.
Her diaries, published a few years ago, showed her to be a competitive and often difficult woman, unlike her charming characters.
She despised Enid Blyton, who also lived in Beaconsfield at the same time, and hated being compared to Beatrix Potter, creator of the Peter Rabbit books. Her books still sell in their thousands and she has a society dedicated to promoting and preserving her tales.
1952 and all that
MORE 1952 pictures of life in the village have come to light since last month’s blog on the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations.
As mentioned in February, fancy dress parades were very much the vogue of the day as these lovely pictures taken at a summer fete in the grounds of the White House, in School Road, Tylers Green show.
We’ve also unearthed a picture of Mrs Woodbridge standing in front of the corrugated iron hut, also in School Road, which served as Dr Starkey’s surgery at the time. It was on the other side of the road from the Old Queen’s Head, and in fact the bus stop there is still named Doctors’ Surgery even though today’s surgery is about a quarter of a mile away. (Sadly it won’t reproduce on here for some reason beyond my technical capabilities, but I’ll keep trying!)
Don’t forget there’s plenty being planned in the village for the Platinum Jubilee between Thursday 2 June and Sunday 5 June.
Following mention in the February blog that ‘Guess the Weight of the Vicar’ was one of the 1952 fete attractions, Penn and Tylers Green vicar Mike Bisset has happily agreed to be the subject of a similar guessing game this time round for the fun and games being planned on the common for Saturday 4 June.
A number of roads in the village are also making plans for street parties on the afternoon of the 5th.
Getting back to normal…
COVID restrictions are lifted and cases continue to fall (there were 80 new cases in Penn, Tylers Green and Hazlemere last week compared to 380 a week at the beginning of the year).
Consequently many social activities which paused temporarily or long-term during the last couple of years are getting back on a regular footing again. Here’s a handful…
Tiddlywinks classes have resumed at Penn Street Church…Manor Farm Scouts are holding a table top sale at Hazlemere Community Centre on 19 March (10am)…Weekly bingo is back at Hazlemere Community Centre and twice monthly bingo sessions have returned to Hazlemere Golf Club… the crazy golf course at the golf club will reopen in a few weeks…Penn and Tylers Green Football Club is resuming its Race Nights (first one 12 March)…Comedy nights at the Potter’s Arms in Winchmore Hill are back in full swing (next one 31 March)…
To contact this blog please email peter@pennandtylersgreen.com