Tag Archive | Somerset

1955 University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour of the West Country

In the 1950s the University of Bristol Dramatic Society had a tradition of undertaking summer tours of West Country villages, performing one of two plays in schools, church rooms, and village, town and Women’s Institute halls. I don’t know when this tradition started, nor when it ended, but I do know that such a tour took place both in 1955 and 1956. My parents became engaged while they were on the 1955 tour, when my mother was 21 and my father about to turn 24.

1955 UBDS Players Tour programme

I know little about these tours, but during my riffling through family papers and photographs I have been able to piece together a small account of the 1955 tour. I’ll try in the coming weeks to do something similar with the 1956 one, for which I have less information. But right now the focus is on 1955.

The two plays that were performed were As You Like It by William Shakespeare, and The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde. The first performance of the tour was on Friday 8 July 1955, at Wells Town Hall in Somerset, and the final performance was possibly at the Town Hall, Dulverton, also in Somerset, on Thursday 4 August 1955. In between the tour travelled mainly through Somerset, but also ventured into Devon and Dorset. On Friday 29 July my parents got engaged, while they were at the Somerset village of Hardington Mandeville.

Luckily a typewritten itinerary for the tour survives, annotated by my father, as well as my mother’s diary for 1955. There is a very slight discrepancy between the two for places and dates, but I would be inclined to follow the itinerary as I think the diary entries might represent the preliminary dates given to the cast and crew, before being refined into what was presented in the typewritten itinerary. Certainly my father didn’t amend any of the dates or places on it.

The 34 photos that survive are very small black and white prints, but they can tell a lot about the life on the tour. Two lorries were packed up by the side of the Victoria Rooms in Bristol: it seems the whole production was carried in these two vehicles. The students roughed it, sleeping in the halls after the performances, or if the weather was clement, sleeping out under the stars. Each day the production had to be unpacked from the lorries, the stage, backdrop, sound and lighting, and seating for the audience set up, the costumes and make-up and wigs put on often in makeshift dressing rooms (again, sometimes outdoor ones), and the performance given. Then everything was taken down, packed up and ready for the next stop on the schedule. Sometimes there were two performances in a day, a matinee and an evening performance, in different places. Sundays were a day off.

My father’s annotations of the itinerary mark three open-air performances, and that there was no audience for the evening performance of The Importance of Being Earnest at the Women’s Institute hall in Beer, Devon, on Monday 1 August!

The photos as found were in a muddled pile, with no negatives to help with ordering them, and no annotations on the backs. I have put them in some sort of order here, but as many of the places shown are unknown to me, I almost certainly haven’t placed them in the right order.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Packing the lorry outside the Victoria Rooms, Bristol, ?8 July 1955. Photo 2264.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Packing the lorry outside the Victoria Rooms, Bristol, ?8 July 1955. Peggy Riddel at left. Photo 2265.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Travelling in the lorries. Photo 2266.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. A stop in a town. Squinting at the original with a jeweller’s loupe I can see the pub/hotel is The Old White Hart or less likely The Old White Hare, and that the street opposite the pub/hotel is South Street. Photo 2267.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. I assume the students are buying some food from this gentleman. Photo 2268.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. ?Roger Montague having a snooze in the back of one of the lorries. Photo 2269.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. A stop for candy floss and lollies. Photo 2270.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Shenanigans. This camp site with its distinctive wall was used again during the 1956 tour. Photo 2271.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. On the swings. Photo 2272.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. One of the camp sites. Photo 2273.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Two nymphs and onlookers. Photo 2274.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. I think this lady is Prudence Knowers. Photo 2275.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Night time relaxing – after a performance? ?Roger Montague standing at right. Photo 2276.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Camping in a village hall. Photo 2277.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. I think this must be in one of the Town Halls that the tour visited. ?Peggy Riddel. Photo 2278.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Camp beds in one of the halls. Roger Montague and Peggy Riddel at the pole. Photo 2279.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Constructing the stage. Photo 2280.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Hanging the backdrop with a cuppa. Photo 2281.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. A painted backdrop for As You Like It. Photo 2282.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Getting ready for a performance of As You Like It. Photo 2283.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Backstage at an outdoor performance of As You Like It. Roger Montague seated at front right. Photo 2284.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. An outdoor performance of As You Like It, at a school. Roger Montague at right. Photo 2285.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Drumming up publicity in Somerton, by the Butter Cross, for that evening’s performance of The Importance of Being Earnest: Eric Stevens, (Rev. Canon Chasuble), pushing Pat Whitehouse (Miss Prism) in a chair. Photo 2286.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. A poster for the performance of The Importance of Being Earnest at the Memorial Hall, Merriott on Tuesday 19 July 1955 at 7.30 pm. Photo 2287.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Getting ready outdoors for a performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. John M Cann standing in foreground, Roger Montague second right. Photo 2288.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Waiting for the performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. Eric Stevens in costume as Rev. Canon Chasuble. Photo 2289.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague), Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), Lady Bracknell (Margaret Stallard), Lane (the butler – Wallace Weaving), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann). Photo 2290.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann), Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague). Photo 2291.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann). Photo 2292.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague), Cecily Cardew (Peggy Riddel). Photo 2293.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: L-R: Miss Prism (Pat Whitehouse), Cecily Cardew (Peggy Riddel), Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann), Rev. Canon Chasuble (Eric Stevens). Photo 2294.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann), Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), Cecily Cardew (Peggy Riddel). Photo 2295.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Lady Bracknell (Margaret Stallard), Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann), Rev. Canon Chasuble (Eric Stevens), Miss Prism (Pat Whitehouse), Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague), Cecily Cardew (Peggy Riddel). Photo 2296.

University of Bristol Dramatic Society Players’ Tour 1955. Performance of The Importance of Being Earnest. L-R: Lady Bracknell (Margaret Stallard), John (Jack/Ernest) Worthing (John M Cann), Hon. Gwendoline Fairfax (Lesley Coleman), Rev. Canon Chasuble (Eric Stevens), Miss Prism (Pat Whitehouse), Cecily Cardew (Peggy Riddel), Algernon Moncrieff (Roger Montague). Photo 2297.

A lovely story I remember being told was that my parents were so deliriously in love that they kissed during a scene in The Importance of Being Earnest when they weren’t supposed to.

A member of the tour was Wallace Weaving (‘Wally’). He married Anne Lennard, my mother’s good friend at university, on 6 July 1957, just a couple of weeks before my parents married. The Weavings had three children, including Hugo Weaving, who went on to become a rather more famous actor than his father …

We took many of our family holidays in the West Country, and my parents often commented on the large Wellingtonia that grew by the old road by the village of Norton-sub-Hamdon, (now the south side of the A303, just near the turning for Crewkerne), remembering it from their time on the tour. In later years they moved to West Dorset, and I would pass this tree every time I drove to see them. For me, it will always be the tree that marked their falling in love.

A stock photograph in my parents’ photo collection of St Audries School in Somerset. The tour visited here on Thursday 14 July 1955 for an open-air evening performance of As You Like It. I wonder if the cast camped out here? It’s a very romantic setting … Photo 2356.

There are also photos from the 1956 tour, though I think only my mother took part in this (just after she’d graduated) as my father graduated in 1955 and was working by then, and I can’t see him in any of the photos. I don’t have a programme for the 1956 tour, but I do have an itinerary. I will try to put together a piece on what I know of it.

I pulled together a list of everyone I know from the programme that was involved in the 1955 tour: there may be others missing.

Players (some backstage positions as well):

John Barrett: AYLI; 1955 Tour Committee electrician
Carolyn Blackmore: AYLI
Roger Bull: AYLI
Edith Burke: AYLI; assistant producer AYLI; 1955 Tour Committee property mistress
John M Cann: AYLI; IBE; 1955 Tour Committee assistant director
Lesley Coleman: IBE; dance arranger AYLI
Michael Gibson: AYLI; stage manager IBE; 1955 Tour Committee stage director
Jean Goffe: AYLI
Diana Greenhalgh: AYLI
Brian Ives: AYLI; stage manager AYLI; assistant producer IBE
Jill Marshall: AYLI; 1955 Tour Committee catering officer
Roger Montague: AYLI; IBE
Mary Nowell: AYLI
Peggy Riddel: IBE
Margaret Stallard: IBE
Eric Stevens: AYLI (x2 parts); IBE; settings and production AYLI
Ian Turner: AYLI (x2 parts)
Peter Wagstaff: AYLI; IBE
Wallace Weaving: AYLI; IBE; 1955 Tour Committee assistant business manager
Pat Whitehouse: IBE; 1955 Tour Committee property mistress

11 men, 9 women = 20 actors / actors and backstage

Non-acting involvement, might not all have been on the tour:

Sylvia Alexander: music composer AYLI
Helen Floyd: 1955 Tour Committee wardrobe mistress
Prudence Knowers: production, costume and setting design IBE
Jay Parry: 1955 Tour Committee director
John Pople: 1955 Tour Committee business manager
Anne Simon: costume design AYLI
Barbara Somerville: costume design AYLI

2 men, 5 women = 7 non-actors

If all those listed went on the tour, 13 men and 14 women = 27 total. There might have been yet more people on the tour that aren’t mentioned in the programme.

If any readers have any memories or knowledge of the tour, or recognise any of the people or places in the photographs, I’d be delighted to hear.

H Dipper of Labuan

Apr18

My maternal grandparents lived and worked in what was then British North Borneo (now Sabah, a state in Malaysia) from 1919 to 1951, apart from home leave periods, and three and a half years spent in various internment camps in Borneo under the cruel keep of the Japanese during World War 2. My mother and her brother were born there in the early 30s, and I have been researching colonial life in British Borneo for quite a few years now. (One day I hope to publish a book about it. One day …)

The carpentry box belonging to H Dipper of Labuan, British North Borneo.

I watch Antiques Road Trip every now and then, and in a recently-aired episode I was interested to see a large wooden chest filled with carpenter’s tools. The name of the owner, H Dipper, was clearly written on the side; the first part of his address was a little less clear but I could just make out ‘LABUAN’ and below it ‘B. NORTH BORNEO’ (for British North Borneo); to the right of this was other script that had been rubbed out and so was pretty much illegible, though I could make out ‘BORNEO’ again. British North Borneo (first ruled by a Chartered Company and then post-war as a Crown Colony) ceased to be on 16 September 1963 with the formation of the independent Federation of Malaysia, after which time it was (and still is) known as Sabah. So that gives me a terminus ante quem for the date of this box and H Dipper’s sojourn on Labuan, a small island (and now a Federal Territory of Malaysia) off the south-west coast of Sabah.

I am curious to find out more about H Dipper and his life on Labuan. Were his tools part of his work? Maybe he worked for the PWD (Public Works Department)? Or was woodworking his hobby? Maybe the tools were added later and are nothing to do with the life of the box in Borneo. If anyone knows anything about H Dipper (I’m pretty confident in assuming he is a he) I would love to hear from you. You can leave a message in the comments field below.

The box was bought by Charles Hanson in Williton in Somerset for £55 and sold at an auction held by Lawrences of Crewkerne, Somerset for an impressive £220. The programme (Series 5, Episode 6) was first broadcast in October 2012, and I think was probably filmed in the spring of that year.

A little postscript: I do know at least that H Dipper was not one of the civilian internees held at Batu Lintang camp outside Kuching in Sarawak, Borneo, the camp where most of the civilians from British Borneo were held by the Japanese during WW2.

Paeony envy

May16

On Saturday my sister and I did a trip round various National Trust properties in Somerset, and fitted in a visit to Kelways Nursery at Langport on the way back, a specialist paeony and bearded iris nursery. The paeonies were looking amazing, and they weren’t all in full bloom. My sister came away with a trolley load:

Paeonies from Kelways.

Some of the paeonies were on offer as they had been intended for Chelsea Flower Show but had flowered too soon, thanks to the lovely weather we’ve been having recently.

The beautiful view in my rear view mirror on the way home.

Paeonia ‘Shimane Seidai’.

Paeonia ‘Noemi Demay’.

Paeonia ‘Dr Alexander Fleming’.

Paeonia ‘Angel Cheeks’.

Paeonia ‘Syaraku’.

A simple supper: twice baked potatoes

Sep28

This is a recipe from Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall‘s wonderful cookery book River Cottage Veg Every Day!, which I tweaked a tiny bit. It’s a fab cheesy and very filling jacket potato supper, quick and easy to make.

Twice baked jacket potatoes.

I baked some medium sized spuds, whole and unpricked, for about an hour at 200 degrees C / 400 degrees F / gas mark 6.

Grated cheddar, soured cream, spring onions and chives.

In the meantime I mixed together a load of grated tangy mature cheddar (we love Keen’s, made nearby in Wincanton, Somerset, mostly because it is one of the best farmhouse cheddars out there, and partly because Chap is friends with the maker and truckles have been bought at the pub for mates’ rates ….), the best part of a pot of soured cream I had left over from another recipe that only called for a dollop; all the spring onions (scallions to USians) I could find in the veg drawer, chopped roughly, and a massive handful of chives, also chopped roughly. Plus loads of freshly ground pepper (no salt because the cheese is plenty salty already).

When the spuds are cooked (poke ’em with a skewer to test), cut them in half lengthways, and scoop out the centre. Mix this with the cheesy filling and put back in to the potato shells.

Ready to go back in the oven.

Cook for another 10-15 minutes, until as browned as you like them.

Hugh also adds butter to the mix, but I thought that would be dairy overkill, considering all the cheese and cream in there already … He also recommends crisping off the shells in the oven for 10 mins before putting the filling in, which I did, but in my opinion this made them a bit too tough and dried out. So I’ll omit that step the next time. I added shedloads of chives, which his recipe doesn’t use, because we love them and we have three very large and healthy plants in a pot just outside the back door.

Hugh’s recipe can be found here in The Guardian: scroll right down as it’s the last one on the page.

Tuesday stroll: Glastonbury Tor

Dec29

Today we went for a walk up Glastonbury Tor: it seemed like half of Somerset had the same idea as it was such a beautifully sunny day compared to the mostly soggy grey ones we’ve been having recently. (Click on all photos to embiggen/bigify/largeificate).

Glastonbury Tor in the distance with the ruins of the church of St Michael’s Church on top, the tor rising prominently out of the Somerset Levels that surround it.

Glastonbury Tor is a small, isolated hill which stands out from the flat expanse of the Somerset Levels around it. It is formed from layers dating from the Jurassic period: the tor itself is Bridport Sandstone, overlying Blue Lias and clay. Only the tower of the church of St Michael that formerly stood there now remains. This dates from the 14th century. Local lore says that Glastonbury Tor is the Isle of Avalon of legend, and is reputedly the burial place of King Arthur.

The tower of the Church of St Michael on top of Glastonbury Tor.

South-west face of the tower.

South-east face of the tower.

Lovely graffiti on the tower by J H Burgess, who visited on 21 May 1864, and revisited in 1869 and 1874.

Panorama from the tor, looking from the north-east (in the first photo) clockwise round to the south-west (sixth photo). The village at the foot of the hill in the middle distance in the second photo is Pilton, and nearby is Worthy Farm, of the famed Glastonbury Festival.

On the top of the hill is a lovely engraved plaque showing directions and distances to other notable places and features in the area.

The tor cast a wonderful shadow over the surrounding lower land (view looking north).

The low-lying Somerset Levels are very prone to flooding and drainage is a very important part of the land management there, with many straight drainage ditches (rhynes, pronounced reens) cutting across the landscape.

Waterlogged fields after the heavy rains of the past few weeks.

The countryside is looking unnaturally green for the time of year, a result of the very mild and wet weather we have been having. We’ve barely had a frost this winter, let alone a prolonged cold spell: compare with photos I took on 16 January 2015 on a walk in Wiltshire, almost exactly a year ago.

Wells

Nov8

It’s been pretty wet and miserable here for the last few days. This is a photo I took of a rainy day in the beautiful cathedral city of Wells a few years ago. It had been a lovely sunny day, and we’d been for a long walk around the sights – the Cathedral, Vicar’s Close, Bishop’s Palace and the many beautiful secular buildings – and then the heavens opened. We went back to the car and I took this photo from inside through the windscreen as the rain pelted down. I quite like its impressionistic quality.

A rainy day in Wells.

Earlier on had been like this:

Vicar’s Close, Wells. Constructed between 1348 and 1430.

Wells Cathedral. Built between 1176 and 1490.

Wells Cathedral.

and then the rain blew in. I like the fact that we get such changeable weather here – there’s often drama in the skies (apart from when it’s a flat, dull, grey day – not much drama then).

If you’re a film fan, Wells is the setting for Hot Fuzz: the co-writer and director, Edgar Wright, grew up in Wells. The Cathedral was digitally removed from the film though, I think because it was too imposing and took away from the smaller parish church, the Church of St Cuthbert, that featured in the film. Some of the filming took place in the Bishop’s Palace grounds, though.

The Piet Oudolf garden at Hauser & Wirth, Bruton

Sep22

We had a look round here on Saturday. The old farm buildings have been beautifully restored and altered for use as a gallery exhibition space, and new buildings have been added. My favourite part was the modern cloister, with clever planting. I assume the planting is by Piet Oudolf, who designed the beautiful meadow garden behind the gallery. The gallery and gardens are free to enter. The next exhibition there is one of photos by Don McCullin.

The late summer prairie-style planting was looking spectacular, and the garden was alive with bees and butterflies and hoverflies and dragonflies and damselflies and other assorted bugs and beasties. I think any beekeepers round there must be delighted!

Hauser & Wirth Somerset website

Sunday stroll: Down through Dorset

Sep14

Not really so much a stroll as a bimble in the car with a short walk at the end of it. Chap and I headed for the seaside yesterday, taking a long and slow route through Somerset and Dorset’s winding country lanes.

We stopped off at several places en route. First stop was the church of St Andrews in Yetminster. Here we admired the 15th-century painted decoration still surviving on the stonework and woodwork and a reminder of how our mostly now-plain parish churches would have looked in the past. There was a splendid brass monument to John Horsey (died 1531) and his wife on one wall, and another, stone this time, to Bridgett Minterne, who died in 1649. While we were there we were surprised by the church bells, which rang out ‘God Save the Queen’ – very unexpected. Apparently this happens every three hours to remind the villagers of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee in 1897. I wonder if it happens through the night? There are some fantastic gargoyles on the tower, and a beautiful golden weathercock, but my photos of these haven’t come out very well and so don’t do them justice.

15th-century painted decoration at St Andrew’s, Yetminster.

Brass monument to John Horsey (died 1531) and his wife, St Andrew’s, Yetminster.

Monument to Bridgett Minterne (died 1649), St Andrew’s, Yetminster.

The tower with gargoyles and golden weathercock, St Andrew’s, Yetminster.

Next stop was the reservoir at Sutton Bingham. We went for a short walk along the edge of the reservoir through the wildflower hay meadow that is managed by Wessex Water, but as it had been given its annual cut not too long ago there wasn’t much to see. On the water there were mainly gulls and a few ducks, and a heron perched on the opposite shore. Sadly we didn’t see the osprey that are summer visitors here. A few dinghies and sailboats from the yacht club were pootling up and down the water, all very Swallows and Amazons.

A Mirror dinghy on Sutton Bingham Reservoir.

Then down into deepest Dorset and the Marshwood Vale. We stopped at the village of Stoke Abbott, parking near a lovely lion’s-head fountain of spring water with a spring-fed stone trough for horses nearby, both under a mighty oak planted in 1901 to celebrate the accession of Edward VII to the throne following the death of Victoria. We wandered off to look at the church of St Mary the Virgin. There had been a wedding there recently, as the fresh and dried flower confetti lay on the path and the church was still adorned with the wedding flowers. The church is in such a pretty setting, and has a 12th-century font with wonderful carvings.

Lion-headed fountain for spring water at Stoke Abbott.

Spring-fed water trough for horses, Stoke Abbott.

St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott.

Wedding flowers at the porch, St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott.

The 12th-century font, St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott.

Wedding flowers and the simple lectern, St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott. The flowers included agapanthus and Mollucella laevis (Bells of Ireland).

Notice in the porch, St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott.

The sadly sheep-free graveyard, set in the most beautiful countryside, St Mary the Virgin, Stoke Abbott.

A lovely thatched house near the church in Stoke Abbott.

When we got back to the car a family (grandparents and wee granddaughter, we guessed) were filling up a car boot-load with numerous bottles and containers of the spring water, so I assume it’s safe to drink.

After a fruitless search for the cottage in Ryall where my family had spent several summer holidays in the late 60s (Mr and Mrs Kinchin’s B&B), we headed for the sea at nearby Charmouth. The weather was wild and windy, and we had a chuckle over the couple braving it out with their windbreak and deck chairs. We watched a kestrel quartering the top of the landslip cliffs, searched in vain for fossils, walked a short way up the beach and then decided to head home, via Bridport, Dorchester and Shaftesbury. We are so lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the world.

A blustery afternoon at Charmouth.

No-one in the water, unsuprisingly.

The well-named Golden Cap on the right.

Is it a ring, is it a hillfort?

Jan29

A vintage modernist moonstone and sterling silver ring:

Ring.

Cadbury Castle, Somerset, an Iron Age hillfort, as drawn by William Stukeley, 15 August 1723:

Iron Age hillfort.

As an archaeologist, I tend to see archaeological-related shapes everywhere: the ripples in a pond are the conchoidal ripples on the ventral surface of a flint flake; the tarmac repair in a pavement over a service trench is a prehistoric ditch, waiting to be excavated; the fruit and nuts in Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut Chocolate are the inclusions in coarse Bronze Age pottery (okay, maybe I’m getting a bit carried away here …)

So it’s no great surprise I suppose that when I saw this ring, the first thing I thought of was the famous Stukeley engraving of Cadbury Castle (which he called Camalet Castle: it’s near the villages of West Camel and Queen Camel, and local tradition holds that it is the site of King Arthur’s Camelot). I have a copy hanging in my study and love it very much.

Cadbury Castle, just to the south of the A303. The enormous earthworks show up much better in the winter, when there is no foliage on the trees. 26 April 2009.

Cadbury Castle, photographed from the A303. The enormous earthworks show up much better in the winter, when there is no foliage on the trees. As you can see, there is some artistic licence in the Stukeley version of this view … 26 April 2009.

I drive past Cadbury Castle frequently, as it is just to the south of the A303. I remember as a child being taken to the excavations there one summer when we were holidaying in the south-west, and the Iron Age body sherds were being sold for 3d a piece (I think it was) with a sign saying the proceeds would go to the diggers’ beer fund. I bought a couple of sherds and they were my treasured possessions for a long time. Until I lost them, and promptly forgot about them, as kids do.

It’s a great spot for a walk too, and always very empty of people. There is a terrific view of Glastonbury Tor from the hillfort.

Cadbury Castle. View from the top of the ramparts. 24 January 2010.

Cadbury Castle. View from the top of the ramparts (Glastonbury Tor sadly out of shot). 24 January 2010.

And as for the ring, it’s for sale in my Etsy shop.

UPDATE: 18 March 2015 – the ring has now sold. Sorry!

LATER UPDATE: This became the first in an occasional series on my blog, titled ‘Rings that remind me of things‘.

Favourite pubs: The Blagdon Inn, Blagdon, near Taunton

Aug31

My family spent a lovely lunchtime yesterday celebrating our father’s 83rd birthday at the Blagdon Inn, in Blagdon near Taunton, at the foot of the Blackdown Hills in the beautiful county of Somerset.

The Blagdon Inn, Blagdon, Somerset.

This pub has only recently opened (in March this year; previously it was the White Lion, before that an Indian restaurant, and before that another pub), and I have eaten lunch there with my Dad some four or five times, the first time when it had only been open a fortnight. Each time the food has been exceptional and the service warm, friendly and attentive. The pub hasn’t yet found the public we all think it deserves, so I am doing my tiniest bit to publicise it.

The chef, Sam Rom, formerly worked at the famed River Cottage canteen in Axminster. The Blagdon Inn shares the River Cottage ethos in that the food is locally produced, sustainable and seasonal. The pub has land near the pub on which are kept chickens, pigs and sheep (all of which end up on the menu in one form or another), and on which much of the produce used in the food is grown. What they can’t produce themselves is sourced locally. The menu has never been the same, and each time I have the hardest time choosing as there is rarely anything on the menu I wouldn’t want to devour …. (August sample menu here).

Memorable dishes I have eaten include a pearl barley and spring asparagus risotto, kipper hash and free-range fried eggs with capers, pulled pork crumble, lamb shank in a gorgeous rich sauce, and bar snacks such as a Blagdon pork sausage roll, potted crab, a kipper and barley scotch egg made with a quail’s egg, lovely spicy roasted almonds, Kalamata olives, and garlic bread. Sam’s twitter feed has some great photos of the food served. I can’t look without salivating!

Blagdon pork sausages, chop and mash. Photo from the Blagdon Inn website.

The attention to detail is wonderful—the bread is homemade and comes on chunky wooden boards, homemade ketchup comes in tiny preseve jars, homemade chunky chips in a white enamel mug, bar snacks on vintage china, and yesterday’s food was decorated with nasturtium, borage and violet flowers, with pea shoots beautifully draped over. Even the paper napkins are really thick and good quality.

Eton Mess at the Blagdon Inn. Several of these got scoffed by us yesterday lunchtime! Photo from the Blagdon Inn website.

Luckily our other halves were driving, as my sisters and I guzzled several of the lovely proseccos served with fresh raspberry puree—divine!

The pub is a beautiful old building which has been lovingly restored and redecorated, and displays art by local artists, some of which is for sale.

The owner, Nigel Capel, has recently launched a wonderful new initiative in conjunction with the local RVS. It helps older gentlemen in the community who are isolated and lonely to get out and about and meet new friends—a volunteer can bring an older gentleman to lunch in the pub on the first Tuesday of each month, where they will both enjoy a free light lunch. If they are lucky they might see Nigel’s beautiful old Austin parked in the car park.

I have to give a special mention to the manager, Tim, who is an absolute star. Thanks Tim, and all the lovely staff at Blagdon.

Inglenookery

West Country witterings