Leisure

Christmas Eve at the Front

An interesting letter has just been received by Mrs Packer, of Broadclyst, from her husband, Corpl Packer of A Company, 1st Battalion Devonshire Regiment, who is serving with the Expeditionary Force in Northern France. In the course of a letter he describes a remarkable incident which occurred on Christmas Eve between the British and German trenches.

TURN the clock back a few years

and the class-room request “Miss will you play the guitar?” would almost certainly have fallen upon unresponsive ears.

But not any more. Miss – and, indeed, Sir for that matter – is just as likely to oblige, thanks to a course in guitar playing which has started at the Bideford teachers’ training centre at Grenville Street, Bideford.

The idea, it has been said, is to “enrich life in school.” Once upon a time, teacher played the piano while the children sang: the new image, it seems, if that of teacher playing the guitar.

Fewer people, it appears, play the piano nowadays, whereas it is relatively easy, provided some natural aptitude is present, for a few basic chords to be learnt on a guitar – and let’s face it, it is much cheaper and more portable!

NO AGE BAR

Nearly 30 teachers, both men and women, are taking advantage of the once-a-week beginners’ course at their Bideford centre and an age range from the early 20s to around the 60-mark shows that there is no age bar to being “with it” as far as the latest teaching methods are concerned.

Not that there is any question of pop music – not even a Bideford version of the current hit “Guitar man” – being heard in the classrooms of the area. Mostly, folk songs and spirituals will be taught, and instructor Mr. John Dunning, who during schooltime teaches primary children at Marwood, reports that his adult guitar pupils at Bideford are “very keen.”

In two years time, he says, most will have reached the stage where they will be able to teach the basic principles to the children of their own classes – an invaluable addition to their teaching repertoire at a time when participation is becoming more and more the keynote in music lessons.

A great deal will depend, it seems, on how well the teachers do their homework ....

Gazette article 20 October 1972

Age No Bar To Knitting

Tribute was paid in a recent issue of ‘Gateway’ the journal of the Church of England Children’s Society,

to the work over a number of years of Miss Maria Heywood, who will be 96 next Christmas Day, and her niece, Miss H Jewell, aged 80, both of Clovelly, who have knitted dozens of pairs of socks for the Society.

In the picture, taken in their home, 106 High Street, Miss Heywood is sitting near the window.

Miss Heywood is now confined to her house, having broken her hip four years ago. Before coming to Clovelly to live she lived in Barnstaple.

Miss Jewell, however, every Sunday climbs the hill to the Church, and she has been a member of the Church Council for the past 37 years.

Gazette article dated 5 August 1960

New Gateway To King George’s Fields

This handsome new gateway to the Bideford Park extension, to be known as King George’s Fields, has recently made its appearance.

It is perhaps not generally known that one of the conditions of the grant from the King George’s Fields Foundation towards the development of the park extension was that a suitable gateway to the fields should be erected bearing two approved plaques.

All the land to the north of this gateway and the one to the river bank opposite is King George’s Fields.

Gazette article dated 21 September 1951