December 2011

NEWS

To our loyal readers . . .

Hoping you have a very happy Christmas and a magnificent New Year. We appreciate your continuing support.

May 2012 be auspicious for you!

From the Editor and staff of The Southwold Organ and Leiston Press

Third outing for the Adnams 10k

Southwold again played host to the Adnams 10k 2011 race on Sunday, 20th November. On another spectacularly beautiful sunny Sunday that was most unlike the usual weather at this time of year, 700 runners took part, following the same circuit as last year by starting at The Harbour Inn and ending at The Red Lion after three laps totaling, unsurprisingly, ten kilometres.

Middle-distance running legend and Olympic medalist Steve Cram was present but did not participate in the race, unlike last year, joking that he was so good last year he had been banned from taking part! He instead acted as race starter, using a hooter, and he also presented prizes at the end.

Tim Topper of the Norwich Road Runners came first, completing the course in an impressive 34 minutes and 9 seconds. Alexandra Smith, also of the Norwich Road Runners, was the first woman across the line in 41 minutes and 41 seconds.

Congratulations to everyone who participated and finished! It continues to be quite a spectacle and is for a worthy cause. Full results and more can be found at http://adnams10k.co.uk.

Continuing to remember

Ninety-three years after the guns finally fell silent on the Western Front and 90 years after the founding of the British Legion, the community of Southwold remembered those who have fallen (and sadly continue to fall) in conflict over the last century in a dignified ceremony at the War Memorial on 11th November itself, and in the Remembrance Day Sunday parade and church service on 13th November. Turnout was particularly impressive this year. Remembrance Day seems increasingly to resonate among people.

Peter Webb

Peter Webb, who has died at home aged 81, came to Southwold some 20 years ago and decided to devote himself to the welfare of the town.

To begin with, he quickly joined many bodies and societies and organisations, which welcomed him as a new resident who was keenly interested in the community.

One of the first things he took on and became chairman of was Splash, the ambitious but failed plan to have a public swimming pool in Southwold. He also became chairman of the Christmas Lights, a colourful and established occasion, but which needed funding.

His involvement in other bodies and societies is like a roll-call of what makes Southold such a busy and interesting town. He was a member of the

Southwold and Reydon Society, the Hospital’s League of Friends, the St

Edmund’s Hall Committee, the local Conservative Association, the Southwold Theatre and others. Once a month, he also delivered the Parish Magazine in the High Street.

For 17 years, he was a member of the Southwold Town Council, becoming Mayor in 2001. He was a fully committed and knowledgeable and sensible

councillor who usually had an opinion on planning and other subjects, and expressed it forcibly and clearly.

He was a familiar sight on his bicycle and his tricycle – when he was

Mayor, he flew the town’s pennant – and later, when he was infirm, on his electronic buggy.

John Miller

Wonderful Ways With Words

Southwold played host to a veritable galaxy of luminaries from the literary world over five days last month as part of the Ways With Words literary festival mainly operating out of St Edmund’s Hall.

No fewer than 21 writers descended on our sleepy little seaside town between 10th and 14th November to talk about their latest books and their work, and sometimes also reflect on their lives.

With everything between the ascerbic domestic fiction of Joanna Trollope and Julia Blackburn’s exploration of Italy’s Ligurian coast to the rollicking Yorkshire reminiscences of Gervase Phinn and Martin Bell’s literally poetic take on life, for once the cliché was correct and there was something for everyone and for all tastes, plus Tilly’s Tours was on hand to give interested parties a unique look around Southwold with Ian Miller.

I was fortunate enough to be able to attend some of these events and can say it was a memorable experience, with my interest being tickled and with the chance to see many famous people in the flesh. It was never less than interesting and often provided food for thought.

With so much high-calibre, high-mental-fibre content on offer, I was only able to take in a small sample of this year’s festival, but it was enough for me to start looking forward to next year’s festival already.

The festival started with Tony Benn in conversation about his latest book Letters to my Grandchildren. As The Observer recently noted, he has transformed himself from national bogeyman to national treasure. As Tony Benn retorted, you had to be careful about being a ‘national treasure’ as it suggested you were a kindly old man who was harmless! Despite this, he is nevertheless still a man of strong convictions. As he himself had joked, he stood down from his parliamentary seat in 2001 to spend more time with politics. The question-and-answer session surveyed his extraordinary and long political career (he succeeded Sir Stafford Cripps in his first constituency). As his questioner quipped: not only did his father know Lloyd George but so did he! He also gave his thoughts about the current and future state of the world. There was a common thread to all this: the quest for democracy. In his book, he says that the function of democracy is to translate what was happening on the street into legislation. He was critical of politicians who listened too much to focus groups. Self-selected focus groups could never substitute for the power of people to choose their own government and hold them to account. He deplored the fact that many young people were cynical about voting, as he did not think cynicism was the way forward. The talk ended humorously: he had been caught short while driving in central London last year (a function of getting older) and could not find a lavatory. He had opened the hood on his car and ‘leaned over’. At that point a man came up to him and said, ‘I think I know your problem. Your radiator’s leaking!’.

In a complete change of tone and content, which was one of the delights of the festival, I then went to see Lucinda Lambton’s fascinating and witty talk about animal architecture, as outlined in her latest book, Palaces for Pigs. That the wealthier members of our society cared so much for their animals that they memorialised them in architecture at no mean expense in some cases, and the variety of animals was a revelation. Given the number of examples in her slideshow, our countryside must be liberally dotted with these, sometimes frankly bizarre, structures. Every type of animal structure was covered, from a five-towered castellated fortress for ducks to a temple for terrapins and a stone pyramid commemorating a pig. There was a foxes’ earth built ‘not for this life but for the next’ by a man who had hunted so much that he was convinced he was bound to be reincarnated as a fox – to make absolutely sure he would be OK hunting was to be banned forever from his land after his death! One of the ‘bullseyes’ of the book, in the author’s opinion, was two tombstones to two rats in a pet cemetery near Cobham: Gladstone and Disraeli!

Finally that day, I joined a throng of festivalgoers in St Edmund’s Church to hear Lord Bragg talk about the King James Bible. He could not have had a more dramatic and appropriate setting, with every pew filled (it was packed out). As part of its 400^th anniversary commemorations, he had written a book about the King James Bible’s impact on the English-speaking world, Book of Books, and this was the basis of his talk. He could have spoken for much longer than the time he had, such was the richness of the topic. It had had an immense influence, both in terms of language and as a driver of social change. He focused on two Williams: William Tyndale, whose 16th-century translation was the basis of at least 80% of the King James Bible (and who therefore changed our language as much as that more famous William, Shakespeare) and William Wilberforce, the leader of the movement to abolish slavery in modern times. The King James Bible was profoundly linked to both of them and great things flowed from this. A very stimulating talk, which, given the surroundings, was almost like a secular sermon!

Next, on the Saturday (12th November), I sampled the pleasures of Simon Hoggart, a last-minute addition to the festival. A natural raconteur, he had us all laughing incessantly as he talked about his latest collection of parliamentary sketches for The Guardian, Send Up the Clowns and his memoir, A Long Lunch, and his life in general. He touched on many subjects; his father (Richard Hoggart), the Lady Chatterley trial, W H Auden’s recipe for a martini (a three-pint jug, a whole tray of ice cubes, one whole sliced lemon, one capful of dried vermouth and entire bottle of gin!), his own early journalistic career, including a stint as a sportswriter, how he ended up as a parliamentary sketch writer, and his observations of the foibles of the leading figures of the day, including Mrs Thatcher’s unfortunate predilection for unwitting double entendres, and a bizarre encounter between Enoch Powell and Bill Haley (of the Comets fame)! One of the funniest men I have ever seen.

I also saw Andrew Davies, the doyen of TV scriptwriting in this country, good naturedly explaining the mysteries of his craft, using his latest big TV project, South Riding, as an example. Unfortunately, the technology did not always co-operate, but he was still able to vividly explain the nuts and bolts. He started by telling a little about himself. It might come as some surprise, but he did not become a full-time writer until 1986. He then gave an outline of the fascinating life of Winifred Holtby, the author of South Riding, as well as the basic story of the novel and its main themes. These were all elements he played with when adapting it for the small screen, illustrating this with clips of the TV production. The talk then broadened out. Mr Davies revealed that he did not go into much detail when writing a script, but did try to influence directors through detail of description. He did not want them to be automatons. Structure was the most important thing about writing. Some good screenplays had hardly any dialogue. When starting a project, he would read the work without any thought of adapting, noticing the bits that moved him the most and marking them rather than getting into the nitty gritty. He would then chop it up. Mr Davies said that he would make up scenes if he could get away with it. However, you had to tread carefully as many books were the favourites of many people, and many were good in their own right as otherwise they would not be adapted. For instance, you mucked around with Jane Austen at your peril. He ended by welcoming the success of Downton Abbey, an old-fashioned series where a plot was allowed to develop over many episodes that had proved very popular. This could only be good, particularly as the BBC would be forced to address this, as it tended not to like spending too much time on a series.

Every event I attended was packed out; the festival clearly taps into a local need. The festival organisers are to be commended for way they smoothly handled the large numbers of people in what is not the largest venue, and kept what was quite a tight programme schedule going.

Finally, thanks to Kay Dunbar, Alice Ling and everyone else at Ways With Words for all their kindness and help.

Roll on next year!

The Editor

Police front desk

Local crime for Reydon and Southwold

On 22nd November, the person responsible for breaking into the church in September was sentenced at the Magistrates’ Court in Lowestoft, and was given a suspended prison sentence and ordered to complete 150 hours’ community service.

Two men are participating in identity parades with regards the two ‘walk in’ thefts from hotel bedrooms in September. One witness has yet to see the identity parade.

Two cars have been vandalised whilst parked in East Street near the Lord Nelson Public House. The offences are not connected in any way with the pub or its customers. A black Porsche sports car was scratched on the morning of Sunday, 23rd October. Parked in the same place the following weekend a grey VW Golf was vandalised. The owners of both cars live in Southwold.

Between 5.50 pm and 6 pm on Tuesday, 25th October: there was a serious assault in the street in Mount Pleasant Road, Reydon. A young man in a small white van argued with one of two young women. He knocked her unconscious and punched and kicked her. Then he drove off. We have arrested him. He returns on bail in December. We would like to speak to anyone who saw the assault.

Evening of Friday, 28th October: red mountain bike pedal cycle stolen from garden in Mount Pleasant Road, Reydon

Overnight Sunday, 30th–Monday, 31st October: a shed at the Harbour was broken into and some diesel was stolen.

End of October to beginning of November: house broken into in Southwold and two shotguns stolen.

6.45 pm on Wednesday, 2nd November: house in Halesworth Road, Reydon broken into. Electrical items and cash stolen. Suspects have been arrested. We would welcome any further information about the crime.

Overnight Monday, 7th–Tuesday, 8th November: window smashed at The Sole Bay Inn and window broken at private house in North Parade, Southwold. The same night windows and glass panel to door broken at house in Hotson Road, Southwold. It is likely this was a failed attempt to break into the property.

Early hours of Wednesday, 9th November (ie just after midnight): group of about four men were disturbed at the rear of a house in Station Road that is being renovated. They had stolen building materials valued at approximately £8,000. On being disturbed, they ran off into St Edmund’s Road where they got into two vehicles: a silver Peugeot (with boot – not hatchback) and a large white-panel van.

Friday, 11th November: local man arrested for drink driving in Reydon. He was three times over the legal limit for driving which is incredibly high. At the time of writing this report, his court case was to be held at the end of November. A member of the public contacted the police because the car driver was clearly drunk and there were concerns for the safety of other road users.

Approximately 5.30 pm on Sunday 13th November (Remembrance Sunday): there was a road accident in Queen Street, Southwold outside the new Tesco supermarket. The account given by witnesses so far is that a silver Renault drove past a black VW Golf, which had broken down, but did so in the path of another silver Renault coming the other way, which did an emergency stop to avoid hitting it. Unfortunately, a red Vauxhall travelling behind it could not stop in time and hit it. The silver Renault which caused the accident was not involved in the collision. We would like to hear from anyone else who saw what happened.

Overnight Sunday, 20th–Monday, 21st November: various metals stolen from a yard in Southwold.

Special Constabulary recruitment evening

Monday, 5th December at Southwold Town Hall, 7.30 pm.

There will be a recruitment evening for anyone interested in joining the Special Constabulary. For further information, see this page on the Internet:

http://www.suffolk.police.uk/joinus/specialconstables/joiningthespecials.aspx.

Mr Guy Mitchell of the Southwold and District Chamber of Trade and Commerce said the following about the Special Constabulary:

‘Special Constables have a valuable role to play in the community. Through tackling anti-social behaviour, crime prevention and policing special events they are a particularly valuable resource in the effort to support local businesses. Community policing, the front line of the police service, is highly valued by businesses and those who volunteer would be making an enormous contribution to making the area an even better place to live, work and visit.’

Dr Letman, the headmaster at St Felix School said:

‘Special Constables provide a unique link between the community itself and the wider police service which works to protect it. They have a vested interest in the community and make a very significant contribution to its protection and wellbeing generally. In areas such as Southwold, Special Constables provide visible reassurance that the community’s interests are being looked after by local officers who understand local needs and issues.’

Mr Mack, the Operations Manager at the Southwold Pier, said that Special Constables help support regular officers in promoting the necessary confidence in making Southwold a safe place to visit and on the occasions that he has experienced when they have dealt with incidents he thought they handled the incidents very professionally.

Adnams had this to say:

‘Adnams have positively encouraged and supported many employees that volunteer their skills to local causes such as lifeboat crews, magistrates and fire fighters. Becoming a Special Constable is a great way to help your local community, a community that Adnams is very proud to be part of.’

The Randolph secures national award

The Randolph Hotel is delighted to announce that they have recently been upgraded to Three-Star Silver Status from Visit Britain, but not only that, so pleased was the assessor with the quality of the offering at The Randolph that we also received a Breakfast Award for the quality of our breakfasts. . .

For those of us in hospitality, these are fantastic accolades and recognition for everyone associated with us.

The assessor commented with regards to our food that: ‘A very good standard of cuisine was experienced throughout this stay at both breakfast and dinner. The menus are innovative and make very good use of the surrounding areas produce.’

‘The Randolph continues to improve year after year with this year seeing more bedrooms, en-suites and the lounge bar refurbished which has lifted presentation and comfort for guests. The proprietors David and Donna are very hands on and staff are trained to the highest standard, this was demonstrated by the whole team during this stay. Well done.’

We are immensely proud of our staff and we thank them so much for their hard work and efforts. We simply couldn’t have done it without each and every one of them. We are also indebted to our local suppliers and tradesmen whom look after us and work with us as they have for the last seven years – thank you very much to you all.

Finally, of course, we very much appreciate the terrific support that we get from you, our community that we live and work in. You are all so fully supportive of us, our functions and our hospitality, and it is a pleasure for us to be able to do so.

Many thanks.

David and Donna, The Randolph

A cheaper, cleaner and greener heating alternative

The UK’s major energy suppliers are bumping up their prices by up to 18% this winter. With the average annual household energy bill coming in at £1,350, saving money on energy bills is foremost in many peoples’ minds.

Durrant Tobin Energy is therefore delighted to announce the launch of its DT Green Log for open fireplaces and wood burning stoves. ‘Green’ heating logs come in many shapes, sizes and ingredients, from reconstituted wood-based to recycled agricultural waste. Having investigated the various green options for a cheaper, cleaner and greener heating alternative, we have opted for a unique recycled rapeseed meal-based solution.

The DT Green Log has already undergone extensive product and market testing in Southwold, Reydon and Walberswick, and feedback has been excellent. Providing possibly twice the heat and three times the burn time of your average firewood, DT Green Logs offer a cheaper and cleaner heating alternative to regular firewood, coal, gas, oil or electricity. The unique production process ensures the DT Green Log is clean to handle, unlike coal and regular firewood. And being made entirely from recycled green waste, the DT Green Log is 100% natural as well as carbon neutral.

We look forward to receiving your enquiries and wish you Season’s Greetings and a warm New Year.

Durrant Tobin Energy, Southwold (www.durranttobin.co.uk)