Nostalgia: The year so far

As the first half of the year ends, it's good to reflect on the past and plan for the next six months.

It is always the intention of the society to engage with other generations, and with this in mind, we were particularly delighted to be able to complete two projects with the help and support of Oldway School. The first, a book written by Karen Chapman and Lee Hayward, is a history of Paignton for children.

Supported throughout by a focus group of year 6 children from Oldway School and their teacher, Nick Harman, the children’s ideas and suggestions were an integral part of the book. The book was published by Julian Rees of Silver Foxes Publishing, whose expertise was invaluable. It was funded by a Local Heritage grant from Torbay Council. The book was featured on BBC Spotlight, and copies were provided free of charge to all the local primary schools. The success of

This book was closely followed by a second book on WW2 in Paignton, and once again we were grateful to the children and teacher Nick Harman from Oldway School, Julian Rees from Silver Foxes Publishing and Torbay Council. Copies of this book were also provided free of charge to all local primary schools.

During the last few months members of Paignton Heritage Society have worked hard setting up a heritage centre in Paignton Library. While there is still much work to be done to get the centre operating as we would like, we will be opening on Saturday, 21 June in order for our members and supporters to see the progress so far. We have been lucky enough to obtain a grant from the Torbay Lottery small grant fund, which has enabled us to purchase necessary equipment and storage for our valuable items, all of which we hope will be available for the public to see in the future.

Our monthly meetings are held on the third Thursday of the month at Gerston Chapel, Torquay Road. An opportunity for our members and supporters to talk to us; we always value their views and ideas for future events. We provide a speaker on a matter of local interest, and tea/coffee is available.

Kirkham House is a medieval property in the centre of Paignton which is owned and administered by English Heritage. We work closely together, and with the help and support of Alan Henshaw from English Heritage, we are delighted to be able to provide guided tours of the property. Following a tour of the house, we are very happy to take visitors to see the clink (Paignton’s first prison) and to the Bishops Tower.

We had a record number of visitors on our open days in April and May, with the newly discovered Medieval graffiti being a source of much interest. In May we had a visit from our MP Steve Darling together with his wife and their wonderful dogs. Councillor Margaret Douglas-Dunbar also came along, and we are very grateful to them for their support.

Recently Paignton Heritage Society has become one of the good causes that players of the Torbay lottery can nominate. Nominees get a proportion of the ticket price of every ticket bought by someone who nominates them. Tickets cost £1 each, and the first prize is £25,000. We are grateful to Torbay Lottery for allowing us to be a participating good cause. Tickets can be purchased on the Torbay Lottery website.

The next six months will see the work continuing in the Heritage Centre in the library so that we are able to display as many of our maps, books and other artefacts as possible for everyone to see. It is planned that the centre will be open three days a week: Monday, Thursday and Saturday, 11am to 3pm.

Our monthly meetings on the third Thursday of the month will continue to be held at Gerston Chapel, Torquay Road, 7pm. We will always aim to provide really interesting speakers, and suggestions from our members regarding our speakers and the subjects they cover are very welcome. Our December meeting features a talk by our president, Nick Pannell, after which a small free buffet is provided for members and supporters.

We are working on plans to set up a Junior Heritage Society to meet one Saturday morning a month in the library from the end of September. This will be run by Jo Tucker, formerly a head teacher, and we will aim to be member driven. We will be looking to the members to tell us what they are interested in and what they would like to see and do.

We strongly believe that we need to foster an interest in local history in younger people and children. Our work with Oldway School demonstrated that the interest is there, and we want to encourage it. We have applied for a small grant to enable us to purchase necessary items for the group and hope to be successful.

Our annual Heritage Day will be October 4th and will be held at the Methodist Church in Palace Avenue. Much of our archive will be on display. There will be a slide show running and other displays yet to be decided. This is an opportunity for people who may not be regular supporters to come along and have a look at who we are and what we do.

Six busy months with six more to come; we welcome new members. Why not join us