It was the chorus of the sing-along Pantomime song some years back, accompanied by framing hand gestures, that we all sang along to with great gusto. That was back in the time when Jill Wilkinson was parking her little van,…
Month: November 2019
The quieter village halls
Amongst the six village halls in this patch, there are three that are really very busy, and three that are quieter. Still sustained by the faithful, still solvent, just quieter. Langley Village Hall, for example, sometimes hosts an evening with…
The Elk’s Head and Whitfield Estate Partnership
I seem to have spent some time traversing the West Allen valley over the past week or so, trying to make this diary a more comprehensive recapitulation of the entities in the whole patch. The Elk’s Head is the last…
Whitfield Village Pantry
I dropped into Whitfield Village Pantry the other day to deliver the new (October) update to the Allendale and Allen Valleys Pocket Directory. While I was there, Janet Marriott graciously (it was lunchtime!) answered a few of my questions, so…
Music in the key of life . . .
I had a lovely chat yesterday with June Welch who embarked on a life-changing career shift in her mid-forties, to embrace the learning and teaching of music. As she says, “For me, teaching is always about learning, both for the…
The message in the medium
There aren’t that many famous Canadians, but Marshall McLuhan is one of them. He it was who in 1964 coined the phrase: “the medium is the message”. A salient sign of the times, in that he meant that the study…
Allendale Bell Tower
Shirley Brown writes in with a lovely and fulsome description of the bell ringers at St. Cuthbert’s: “An article in the Hexham Courant in September 2019 was headed ‘Tower of Friendship and Team Spirit’. I think this sums up nicely…
The High Forest Community Centre
Just about on the road coming down from the ‘heeds into Sinderhope, the High Forest Community Centre has become rather a busy hall over the past few years. Rescued from its near-derelict state by a combination of significant and timely…
Remediation works on the West Allen at Carrshield
Throughout this entire year, but scheduled to be completed by Christmas, the work of the Environment Agency and the Coal Authority in reducing the absorption of lead, zinc and cadmium from the Carrshield tailings dam into the tumbling waters of…
Making the Christmas cake
Apparently we’re a week late on this lovely kitchen task; you’re supposed to make your family’s Christmas cake some six weeks ahead of the day itself, to give it time to mature, and also, of course, to soak up even…