The BAFHS open day will be held at the Severnside Suite, Thornbury Leisure Centre on 18th September. Come and Join us!

Along with my son and granddaughter, I was out on Wednesday 18th August with the “demo” which met at Victory Park to walk our fields draw attention to the shocking plan which would lay waste to our green spaces and allotments. The idea is to build NINE HUNDRED AND TWENTY SIX DWELLINGS thereon. I’ll write it again, so that you will know this is not a mistake. NINE HUNDRED AND TWENTY SIX.

It should have appeared with the last post, but owing to a Ghost in the Machine – didn’t.

Who is the solemn little black boy standing next to the teacher, a rather severe looking Miss Emma Jane Martin, in the picture of the local Infants’ class, boys, on page 73 of  “Brislington” in The Images of England series?  He looks to be about  five or six years old. It is difficult to search without a name, and I am having to assume that he was British born as I can find no relevant child in the district whose place of birth is shown as West Indies, Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados, Bermuda, USA, Africa, Gold Coast in the census of 1911.  

Who were his parents? A black family in our small village must have been unusual at the time, and known to everyone. How did he/they come to live here?

I am continually updating my book “Black Bristolians”, and I wonder if anybody can help with this mystery.

The Bristol Times is a supplement in the Evening Post which appears on Mondays. Recently, there has been correspondence about Bristol South Baths which was used for other activities rather the obvious. I sent my contribution which appeared on Monday 26th July

“Your letters about Bristol South Baths brought back memories happy and sad. As well as roller skating they used to have pantomimes there with the performers amazingly strutting their stuff across the boards laid out over the water. My mother took me and my little brother, by bus from Kingswood, in the early fifties. The strapping “principal boy” was a traditional thigh slapping female and perhaps the pantomime was “Dick Whittington” for I remember joining in singing the bizarre “Open the Door, Richard”.

As to roller skating, about six years later, when working as a petrol pump attendant at Jack Lamb’s Garage in Downend, I became friends with a boy called Barry Turton who worked in the butcher’s across the road. Once a week we would roar off on his motor bike, me on the back, through the freezing fog of the winter nights. Arriving at Bristol South we would join the queue to hire the unwieldy skates which had to be strapped on over your shoes. The most decrepit and ancient pair, with a broken leather toe piece and/or missing laces always seemed to be reserved for me. Some “posh” people had their own skates. What luxury! The noise was deafening: the shouts and screams as people fell over, the racket the wheels made on the wooden boards magnified by the ever present swimming pool echo. I was a useless skater and stuck close to the side but Barry, who was very handsome, treated his fans to an exhibition of fancy footwork in the middle of the arena.

The next summer I went away for six months travelling round Europe (I was a little ahead of my time) – and when I returned home in the autumn of 1959, I heard the tragic news that Barry had been accidentally killed in a motor-cycle accident. He was nineteen.”

Last night, the 28th July, I was delighted to receive a telephone call from Barry’s younger brother, Roger, who by coincidence is visiting the UK from Australia where he now lives. We were able to share a few more memories of Barry. He told me that his mother died a few years ago but that she would have been very happy to know that he is still remembered with affection. 

The ghost is still there – picture saved in the draft, but will not print!

It should have appeared with the last post, but owing to a Ghost in the Machine – didn’t.

You can find me at:  http://twitter.com/dplindegaard

I am sorry to record the death on 13th June of a Brislington resident, Jean Jarvis of Winchester Road at the age of 77.

The funeral, ably conducted by her friend and neighbour, David Jarrett, who also gave the Tribute, took place on at South Bristol Crematorium on 22nd June.

The Hymn “The Day Thou Gavest Lord is Ended” was followed by David’s reading from John 14: 1-6 & 27. Jean’s grandson Remi Jarvis then read from Ephesians 3: 13-19. If the selection of the second hymn, “The Old Rugged Cross” with its rather gruesome words was at first mystifying, all is explained by the second line of the refrain “Till my trophies at last I lay down” for Jean was a past Lady Captain of Knowle Golf Club. Following the service, at Knowle Golf Club, we were privileged to be seated with three former Lady Captains of the club, one still turning out for the county and the eldest aged 94.

I always found Jean to be a cheerful character, who made light of her own suffering and was always concerned for others.

BCAP seized the opportunity to sink a test pit in the back garden at a residential site allegedly in the proximity of the mysterious St Anne’s Chapel.

The contours of the test pit was 71 centimetres deep on all sides, and I was impressed by the professionalism of the  group and the meticulous collection of “finds” though, to me, as a layperson, these were not very inspiring:  – a tiny piece of flint, perhaps evidence of a prehistoric inhabitant of our parish (?), some bits of tile, some suggestion of burning, (charcoal?), a few little stones which could have been anything, some possible “tesserae” (bring your imagination with you) and the small fragments of a white Victorian teacup, including part of the handle.  Better luck next time, I would have thought.

But all good fun and I very much enjoyed my visit on 11th June in glorious sunshine and meeting with Trudy, Dawn and Steve.

The test pit and finds

Dawn hard at work

I am hoping to research the site, so watch this space.