Latest news with #DigforVictory
Western Telegraph
4 days ago
- General
- Western Telegraph
VC Gallery in Haverfordwest reopens after flooding
On Friday, May 30, Barry John MBE was joined by First Minister of Wales, Eluned Morgan who cut the ribbon. Despite the 'unexpected flooding' forcing the VC Gallery's headquarters to close in June 2024, Mr John revealed the facility has been upgraded. First Minister of Wales, Eluned Morgan cut the ribbon. (Image: VC Photo Group) Founder of VC Gallery, Mr Barry John said: 'The reopening went really well. The First Minister of Wales attended alongside the veteran minister. We usually have our breakfast club on a Friday morning, and this was our first one in the new facility. 'There was extensive damage from the unexpected flooding, and we faced lots of difficulties. We had to fight to get it back open. But we had help from Haverfordwest Town Council and lots of support in Pembrokeshire with different programs coming together. The VC Gallery received a lot of support. (Image: VC Photo Group) 'We now have more classrooms and more space overall. You would think the builders would measure everything due to the cost-of-living crisis. But they went above and beyond, working until 4am. 'Tomos Palmer and his team from TGP Glass invested extra crash and hours into the project, putting things in that they bought themselves. We have new tables, ceilings and the installation of fire alarms. The facility is even better than it was before.' Founder of VC Gallery Barry John MBE and Baroness Morgan. (Image: VC Photo Group) Despite the flooding forcing the VC Gallery to temporarily close, Mr John expressed how the charity still did not stop offering help to the community. He continued: 'The First Minister has always been a massive supporter. She was over the moon to reopen the VC Gallery in Haverfordwest. 'She came to visit us during one of her breaks in her busy schedule along with members of the county council who gave their time to speak to veterans with physical and mental disabilities. They genuinely asked brilliant questions. 'After the flooding, some people assumed that things weren't continuing at the charity. But actually, everyone here has been able to provide an engagement passage for those who need it. 'We have been offering our walking groups, our Dig for Victory project and providing alcohol and drug counselling.' After the flooding, the charity never stopped providing support to the local community. (Image: VC Photo Group) Mr John also thanked Phil Kirby from County Electrical Services for installing the electrics in the building. He added: 'It was a bad situation but because of the community and our ethos and culture, we were able to recover. Barry John MBE expressed how happy he was with the new facility (Image: VC Photo Group) 'Similar to when COVID hit, we had to become dynamic and keep supporting locals. We had insurance but that can only cover so much.'
New Statesman
21-05-2025
- General
- New Statesman
The child in time
Alan Garner Air raids did not bother us. I lay in bed, listening as the house shook 'Come here, Alan Garner. My stars and garters and little apples, you look as though you've been dragged through a hedge backwards.' Miss Fletcher pulled me out of the line and set about my hair with a comb. 'I don't know. I've not seen the likes of you in all my born puff.' She pushed me back in front of the sheet draped on the playground wall to have my photograph taken (pictured above). In 1941 the war had little effect on us, the working-class children of rural Cheshire. Parents were urged to Dig for Victory and to Make Do and Mend, and nearly everything was rationed, but our families had always lived more by a system of barter. There were eggs and poultry, and vegetables and fruits in season, and we had the freedom of the lanes, fields and woods to play in. Sweets were the main loss. There were only liquorice roots to chew on, until the Yanks arrived with their candy and gum, which we cajoled from them without conscience, and they gave freely. Meanwhile, the blackout showed us a sky full of stars. What did hurt was when my mother cut an old jacket of hers to fit my size, and I was laughed at in school because it buttoned the girls' way and not the boys'. Air raids did not bother us. I lay in bed, listening to the throb of Dorniers and Heinkels hauling their loads overhead as the house shook with the barrage of anti-aircraft fire from the artillery battery in Johnny Baguley's fields, while Miss Moxon, our air raid warden, kept us safe. Instead of a steel helmet, she wore a colander upside down on her head, tied beneath her chin with string. It was another matter for a younger boy, who later became one of my closest friends. As I lay and listened, 14 miles away in Manchester his mother carried him along Deansgate from their blitzed house by the light of flames all around, stepping over the lifeless forms of women, their clothes shredded by broken glass. He could not see they were mannequins from the windows of Kendal Milne and Company, Upholsterers to the Royal Household. Next morning, I gleaned shrapnel for my Museum of Souvenirs. Bernardine Evaristo, front Bernardine Evaristo I made a virtue of my difference and dressed to stand out even more I look so extrovert in this photograph, so I guess I was, although I could also feel incredibly shy when outside my social comfort zone. This photo was taken in 1976-77 with school mates when I was in the sixth form at Eltham Hill Girls School in south-east London. We were finally allowed to ditch the dreary blue uniform and wear what we liked. My grandmother had taught me to sew, knit and crochet, and out of impecunious necessity, I made my own clothes – the coat, jumper, scarf, beads. As a working-class suburban child who could never fit into the very white and often hostile environment of the Sixties and Seventies, I made a virtue of my difference and dressed to stand out even more. It was a big two-finger salute to what I saw as a repressive conventionality that excluded me. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe I had by then attended Greenwich Young People's Theatre for five years, acted in plays at school and wanted to be an actor, which I became, after I trained at Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance. Theatre was the welcoming community where I felt I belonged – alongside all the other outsiders – and where individuality was cherished. Eltham was the kind of area where the neo-Nazi National Front thrived at that time, and Woolwich, where I grew up, a bus ride away, was a squaddie town where the sight of off-duty soldiers on the lash filled me with dread. Black suburban teenagers did not dress to stand out, but I did. I'm not completely sure what made me so confident to be so flamboyant. My ambition was certainly to escape suburbia and live a free, creative life with likeminded souls. Tick! I was single-minded even then, with a self-belief that would not be swayed by the advice of those who told me to limit my horizons, to play it safe, and who warned that if I didn't, to expect failure. I'm exactly the same today. Frank Cottrell-Boyce on his uncle's motorbike Frank Cottrell-Boyce Uncle Jimmy was always teasing – he put me on the bike for a wheeze The bike in this photo belonged to my Uncle Jimmy. If you look, you can just about see my Aunty Madge staring out of the sidecar. Famously that sidecar – with my aunty still inside – once became detached from the bike when it was speeding down Everton Brow, sending my aunty off down Great Homer Street while he sped on to Stanley Road. I'm always taken aback to see that my childhood was in black and white. The Scotland Road area was so densely populated then. The pavements were thronged with people from all over the world – sailors from West Africa and India, old women with scarves over their heads like extras from Man of Aran. We lived in my grandmother's two-bedroom flat. She had one room, and me, my brother, Mum and Dad, the other. It must have been tense, but I have no unhappy memories. Partly I think because the library was over the road and Mum could take us there to escape the pressure. Obviously the library is gone now –closed by austerity in order to fund bankers' bonuses. Behind those terraced houses were vast, long-vanished tenements, so I had no clue we were living just a few hundred yards from the river and its docks. Until one day I saw the funnel of a White Star Line ship passing behind the chimney pots. Even then I don't think I realised it was the river. I just thought that the next parish was a bit weird allowing ships to come down its street. I look terrified in this picture. I think Uncle Jimmy put me on the bike for a wheeze. I found him very unsettling. He seemed to be always teasing. It was only when I went to see him when he was old and frail that I discovered he kept this photo in his wallet. That all the teasing was some kind of expression of fondness. I suppose when you're a kid, you see things in black and white. Mark Haddon in Northampton Mark Haddon People only talked about their feelings in books and, possibly, in London The double exposure seems right, and not just because I miss the analogue glitches of the pre-digital world, but because there really were two realities, one laid over the other. Visible to everyone was the outer world of Walnut Whips and Scalextrix, blue copper sulphate crystals growing on string dangling inside jam jars and gammon with pineapple rings, the peeling Formica on the kitchen table and Middle of the Road singing 'Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep'. I see images of that world now, on Instagram, in magazines, on TV, and feel a deep yearning which makes no sense whatsoever because all those things hid an interior world of relentless fear and sadness, a nature/nurture double whammy from a mother who was herself profoundly ill-at-ease in the world. Not that I would have used the words fear and sadness at the time. They were simply the colours of the universe. To know that things could be different, to know that it was possible to experience the world differently, would involve knowing what went on in other people's heads. I simply didn't know that this was possible. This was suburban Northampton in the 1960s. People only talked about their feelings in books and, possibly, in London. To be in a mood meant only that you were failing to sit up straight and join in properly. I remember being in the changing room at Eldean Junior School. I would have been seven or eight at the time. A teacher, Mr Phillips, asked me whether I bit my nails because I worried a lot. I still remember the shock of realising that an adult might be able to look at me and see what was going on inside my head. 'No, sir,' I said. 'I'm absolutely fine,' and walked away as fast as I could. Michael Rosen at his childhood home Michael Rosen I haven't yet figured out that although I have an older brother, he doesn't Who is that person? What do you remember of the moment, what do you see behind their eyes, what would you like to tell them or what could they tell you? My brother Brian is inside, I'm outside. He's moved out of the bedroom we shared and now he has his own room. I'm sad that he's gone so I try to get into this room, or peep in through the window, as I am doing here. I love coming and looking at the things he makes: model planes, model cars and lists. He makes lists of everything. Sometimes he has to look after me, when our parents go out. He's supposed to make sure that I go to bed. But I don't. And it drives him nuts. Once I ended up locking me and him in his room by mistake, so our parents came back and found me still up at midnight. We have hundreds of games and jokes. He's brilliant at doing impressions of his teachers and our parents. I end up doing impressions of his impressions. I think that we are quite similar, but I haven't yet figured out that although I have an older brother, he doesn't! That means that I have three parents (Mum, Dad and him), he has only two. At any moment, one of his girlfriends might turn up. I think in this picture I might be asking him about one of them. I might even be doing an impression of her and laughing about it. Geoff Dyer among schoolmates Geoff Dyer We're all looking up at the camera – aspirationally, to the future? Not at all This is my year at Naunton Park Junior School in Cheltenham, but I don't know which year. We were all born in about 1958 so, judging from our faces, this would be, what?… the World Cup-winning year of 1966, when we were eight or nine? I can put names to a few of the faces: Steven Jones, Feisal Khalif, Steven Jacobs. Jennifer Something… the Johnson brothers, whose first names I can't remember. Anyway, the names are irrelevant; what's important is the collective or generational information on display. In a reversal of the usual sequence of photographic procedure, whatever the precise date of the exposure, the image was developed and fixed in an earlier era of shortages and rationing. According to the popular narrative, a black-and-white world blazed into colour in the swinging Sixties, but this picture remains stubbornly monochromatic. The enduring proximity of the Second World War can be seen quite clearly. Some kids look almost middle class, or rather they look less working class than others. How can we tell? We would expect the clothes to be key sociological indicators, but the remarkable thing is that class is there in our faces too. Compare it with a photograph taken at the same time of our contemporaries at Eton and the faces would be entirely different. Class as biology! It's ages since I've seen anyone in the picture; the last person was Feisal, the lone black kid, 20 or 30 years ago in London. Would I recognise any of the grown-up kids in the street? Would they recognise me? Probably not, but once we exchanged names and established who we were talking to, a gap of six decades would shrink to an instant. The faces in the photograph would change into the faces in the street – and vice versa. Some of them are surely dead now, which is a shock because, even though the obituary pages of newspapers are scattered with the names of contemporaries, I don't feel that death is courting or stalking me yet. We all lived near each other and shared pretty much the same experiences. The most important shared experience was still to come – and it was also the most divisive: the eleven-plus. Most would stay on at Naunton Park for the seniors, some would go to the tech, and quite a few would go to grammar school. One – I remember this clearly but can't remember his name or locate the face – would go to a private school. Within a year, those of us who were lucky enough to pass for grammar school lost contact with those who failed. This was not an act of conscious separation. It just happened. Were there families where one sibling went to the secondary school and one went to the grammar? Not as far as I recall, but the reverse was often true. Feisal, for example, followed his older brother Adam to the grammar. We're all looking up at the camera – aspirationally, to the future? Not at all. What we're looking up to, without suspicion and with an abundance of faith, is the beneficent power of the school, of our teachers and, by extension, of the state. I can locate myself in this expanse of faces, but who cares which one is me, and what difference does that make? This is England, my England. Geoff Dyer's memoir 'Homework' is published by Canongate Malorie Blackman at school Malorie Blackman I'd be very careful about what I told the girl in the photograph Ah, what ifs! So tempting with their promise of rectification, so tantalising with their potential for restoration. Back in the day, there were many times when I wished I could travel back in time to talk directly to the girl in the photograph. But then I saw the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode 'Tapestry'. Captain Picard – played by the sublime Patrick Stewart – has the chance to go back in time to change his past, to amend one of his long-term, lifetime regrets. But when he does so, his life unravels, like pulling at one thread of a tapestry only to find that the whole thing falls apart. He finds himself, not the captain of a starship but a lowly ensign who spent his life too afraid to take chances or risks. He is living a dull, unin-spired and uninspiring life which he knows could've been so much more. A bitter pill to swallow. So I'd be very careful about what I told the girl in the photograph. I would not tell her about forthcoming physical and economic challenges, about false friends and just how destructive holding grudges can be. Instead I'd tell her to trust herself, trust her instincts. I'd warn her not to let others define her worth, not to believe others when they downplay her capacity to learn or ridicule her imagination. I'd give her a huge hug and whisper in her ear that she can do anything she sets her mind to – anything. I'd warn her not to let doubts or fear of the unknown or even worse, fear of being laughed at, keep her tethered. Most of all, I'd tell her to value herself, that she doesn't have to make herself small just so others can feel tall. I'd hope she'd listen and believe me. That my words, though they might not make sense at the time, would stay with her through her darkest moments. Michael Morpurgo, aged five Michael Morpurgo My best days: going to the milk bar, watching the trains come chuffing by That's Me. I'm aged five. It's 1948. I'm living at 44 Philbeach Gardens, London. It's my first year of school, at St Matthias with St Cuthbert's LCC school. That's on the Warwick Road. Mum always walks us to school. And we do hop-scotching on the way sometimes. I look forward to the apple we are given each day – they are a present from Canada, the teacher says – and I like the milk we have in playtime, in the little bottle with a straw. It's a bit cold sometimes though, and that gives me a headache when I drink it. On the way to school through the smog I always want to walk on the other side so we don't have to pass the old soldier sitting on a blanket outside the shop with his growly dog. I don't like that dog and I don't like walking past the old soldier because I know he always has one trouser leg that has no leg inside it, and I hate thinking about what that means. But when I feel brave enough I quite like going by him because he's friendly and always calls out to me. 'Morning, young man.' I like that. But I can't stop myself looking at his empty trouser leg. Mum says he must be very brave because he's got lots of medals, so I should always be polite to him and wave. So I do. At school we line up in the playground, and have to do as we are told. It's standing in the corner if you don't, or the ruler on your hand if you're really naughty, like cheeking Miss or swearing. I like playtime best. Footie. I'm goalie sometimes with my back up against the high chain link fence, with the bombsite beyond. If the ball goes over and it's your turn to fetch it, you have to crawl under the fence at the bottom where it's loose and find it. But you're not allowed to and if you get caught it's the ruler, edge on your knuckles, and that hurts a lot. At home I used to like words because I knew words made stories and I loved the stories my mum read us. She's an actress so she tells stories really well with all the actions and funny accents. But at school words are just for spelling tests and copying out your handwriting, not for stories at all. I'm not good at spelling and my handwriting is always blotchy. So I get to stand in the corner quite often. But I don't mind. You get left alone there. At home I get earache a lot and I scratch a lot, because I've got eczema, Mum says, and I mustn't scratch, but I have to. I like playing out best, with Pieter my big brother. We like it best when there's just two of us, making camps in the Keep Out bomb site next door – that's what we call it, but we don't keep out. We like it in there because no one knows we are there. Mum cries sometimes and we know why. It's because of the photo of our Uncle Pieter on the mantelpiece in the sitting room. He's the one my brother is named after. But we neither of us ever met Uncle Pieter because he was killed in the war. In the photo he's always looking into the distance, far away. He's never looking at me, and I wish he would. I don't know him at all, not really, not like Mum does. My best days. Going to the milk bar, walking to the bridge to watch the trains come chuffing by. I like it when a train is passing right underneath us and we are all covered in smoke and coughing and spluttering. And I like my birthday because everyone at school sang me happy birthday. Last time, I saw Belinda smiling at me as she sang it. I think she wants to be my girlfriend. I hope so. But she's in the top class and really old, Pieter says. So I can't marry her. Earache is horrible, but when I think of Belinda, it helps it go away. David Almond on his Tyneside estate David Almond Our little council estate wasn't paradise, but it gave us faith in society It's 1955 and I'm four years old. We've just moved from a slum – a dilapidated Victorian flat with an outside loo – into our brand new pebbledashed council home. The little estate is being built around us. I remember scrambling over that rubble on the bike, playing war games with my brother in that trench just behind me. I'd soon start school at St John's, a spooky stone Catholic place on the banks of the Tyne. The air echoed with the noise of bulldozers and steamrollers, the singing and cursing of bricklayers and pebbledashers. More council estates were being built close by – airy places with parks, swimming pools, community centres, pubs and churches. The houses were well built and they still stand strong. Each had a decent garden. Rents were reasonable and there was no pressure to move on, to get onto a 'housing ladder'. There was a wide range of folk around us – from shipyard labourers to teachers. We never felt that we were looked down upon for living in such a place. These were the great early days of the welfare state and the NHS. My dad had been in Burma in the war. He survived, and shared the optimism of the times – we were all involved in creating a better world. He worked in an engineering office in Newcastle. Mam was disabled by arthritis so couldn't work at all. There were four children in the house. Our sister Barbara died there when I was seven and she was one, an event that haunts all our lives. We stayed until I was nine. By the time I was 13 Dad had bought a house of our own. He died two years later, and Mam was alone with five of us to care for. She always said that it was the after-effects of war that brought him down. I wanted to leave school and go to work but she wouldn't have it. I was the first of our family to go to university. My siblings followed, all of us benefiting from student grants. The little council estate wasn't paradise but it gave us good grounding. We could believe that there was kindness in the world as well as in family, that society could help us to get through tragedy, that it could be designed to help us create fulfilling lives Kathleen Jamie in her school uniform Kathleen Jamie I could chant my nine times table, but didn't know what was wrong with Nana Oh, that uniform. The specially combed hair. We got out at 20 to four and after school we'd go out to play. Mostly we played kerbie or dodgy-ball on the street right outside, or hidey-seek in the back lane. Or skipping or elastics in their season. The wind, the wind, the wind blows high… I knew the textures of my Aran sweater, and of grey harling. I knew secret caverns under bushes, the smell of creosote, McColl's sweet shop and which walls best returned a thrown ball. I knew the neighbours' names and could chant my nine times table but didn't know what was wrong with our Nana. She went off in an ambulance, and had Electric Shocks, but I wasn't supposed to hear that bit. Now and then Linda and I would climb a particular stone wall on the top street that gave views of hills beyond our postwar scheme; below us lay all our streets planned out under modern, clean, white clouds. From time to time a car drove by, or Martin the Baker's yellow van, and we'd wave. The wall was high but we scrambled up easily, not-unhappy children, and let our legs dangle, kicking our heels in gym shoes. Related This article appears in the 21 May 2025 issue of the New Statesman, Britain's Child Poverty Epidemic
BBC News
26-04-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
VE Day 80th celebrations in North Yorkshire
Victory in Europe Day, known as VE Day, is celebrated on 8 May to mark the moment the Allies formally accepted Germany's surrender in across North Yorkshire are being encouraged to join in the celebrations and commemorations, with York's City Walls lit in red, white and blue from Monday 5 until Thursday 8 Kilbane, executive member for economy and culture at City of York Council, said: "The end of the war in Europe is a moment to celebrate. It also reminds us of the sacrifices people made so that we can be free today. "So let's come together in our streets, communities and workplaces and mark this 80th anniversary." Scarborough service On 8 May, the Royal British Legion Scarborough branch will hold a service of prayers and wreath-laying in Alma Square from 11:00 BST. Cocktails and lunch On 10 May, there will be a cocktail reception and formal lunch at Middlethorpe Hall & Spa near York from 12:30 four-course meal will have a "Dig for Victory" theme, using produce from the venue's own gardens and local will be accompanied by live music from York's Celebration Singers. Military Wives concert St Wilfrid's Garrison Church in Strensall will be hosting a concert by York Railway Institute Band and the York Military Wives event, at 19:30 BST on 8 May, will feature old and new songs that evoke memories of 1945, concluding with a Last Night of the Proms-style are priced at £10 per adult and £5 per child. 'We'll Meet Again' Yorkshire Air Museum in Elvington will hold celebrations on the weekend of 10 and 11 museum said its "We'll Meet Again" weekend would be its "big event of the year", featuring reenactors in 1940s dress, who will be giving demonstrations and talks, with vintage vehicles on show and tables and chairs set out for a street party. Proms and family fun On 8 May, Ripon Cathedral will be hosting a VE Day anniversary proms, with children from a local school giving readings. Tickets are £ City Council will host a free event in the market square from 18:00 to 21:30 BST, with live music, a climbing wall, vintage games and family friendly on Sunday 11 May, there will be a traditional parade through Ripon for the Installation of the new Mayor of Ripon at Ripon will also be a performance of stories of Yorkshire Normandy veterans, as told by Ripon Theatre Festival and the Ripon Community Poppy Project, at Lister House. Victory in Europe exhibition On 1 May, York Army Museum will launch its Remembering Victory in Europe exhibition showcasing regiments and the home front in will be live performances at 17:00 and 19:00 BST on 8 May telling the stories of two of York's Normandy 10 May the museum will host a dramatisation offering an insight into the lives of prisoners of war, and highlighting the ethnic diversity of the veteran community. Evensong commemorations On 8 May, York Minster will host a special Evensong commemorating the 80th anniversary of VE Day, starting at 17:30 BST. Knaresborough Castle On 8 May at 18:00 BST, Knaresborough Castle will host themed entertainment including performances from local musicians, bands and dance of the Knaresborough Branch of The Royal British Legion, Sea Cadet Corps, Army Cadet Force and Air Training Corps will parade in the castle grounds and lead attendees to gather at the War Memorial for prayers of remembrance. Do you have memories of VE Day? Share your stories, email Listen to highlights from North Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North or tell us a story you think we should be covering here.
