Rye ratepayers should be holding their breath on 8 November, when Rother District Council's full meeting will discuss a report from its Treasurer on the long-running double rating or "concurrent functions" dispute. If the report is accepted, it will mean that in future Rye will pay the same special rate - for the maintenance of public land, etc. - as Bexhill, instead of a vastly enhanced rate higher than anyone else's. We will report on this next week, but keep your fingers crossed.
Rye Museum was an unusual setting on Saturday for an unusual party. The Directors of John Jempson & Son Ltd., and the Rye Museum Association were jointly celebrating the publication of "The Transport Contractors of Rye", a history of the firm by Theo Barker, Professor of Economic History in the University of London (reviewed in GAZETTE no. 5). Professor Barker was able to be present, and spoke about the writing of the book; also - among the guests - very limited in number because of the available floor space in the Museum - was a representative of the publishers, London University's Athlone Press. Jonathan Jempson presented copies of the attractively produced volume to the Mayor of Rye, the Mayor of Winchelsea, the Headmaster of Thomas Peacocke School, and of course to Geoff Bagley, Curator of Rye Museum, for their respective libraries; a copy also went to the Rye Conservation Society.
Jempson is a name which seems linked to expansion (there is a cousinly relationship with the Peasmarsh supermarket). Jonathan Jempson was able to point out that the firm employed 100 people before the recession - and still employs 100 people. All the fleet of more than 60 vehicles (with a combined capacity of well over 1000 tons) is kept busy on the road, and not only on British roads but also on those of Eastern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. As well as its transport services, which effectively started in 1924 with John Jempson and a Model T Ford, the company offers workshop and engineering facilities and various ancillary services including overnight parking for commercial vehicles - in a yard whose spotless condition could well be copied elsewhere in the town, says the GAZETTE with feeling.
It was supposed to be kept quiet that the BBC radio programme "Down Your Way" will be paying Rye a visit, but the news leaked out as news will, and so we asked the Town Hall for details. The show's producer, Anthony Smith, will be in Rye on 17 November, and recordings will be made on the 18th; the show goes out on 16 January, with a repeat next day. The Town Clerk, with advice from the Mayor, Bill Simpson, and Deputy Mayor, Jo Kirkham, is preparing a list of suitable interviewees, reflecting the history, interests and industry of the town. From this list the producer will select the people he likes the sound of; and these interviews will be whittled down yet again for the finished programme.
Thomas Peacocke School next week welcomes a visit from the Wealden Youth for Christ team, a group of some 14 people who aim to show the pupils what modern Christianity can mean. Working closely with Ian Pidoux and Stuart Davis the team will be in Rye from Monday 8 November until the Saturday following; during the day they will be in school, taking lessons and assemblies, and giving lunchtime concerts, etc. while on four evenings there will be a coffee bar open in the town, with music, films, and opportunities for socialising as well as for private conversation for those who would find this helpful. The week will close with a joint service on Sunday evening, of thanksgiving for the week's achievements. A professional band "New Beginnings" with a soloist-singer, and a drama company "Back to Back" will take part in the mission, which is organised very much in conjunction with the local churches - not only those in the Rye Group of parishes; but any church with Thomas Peacocke pupils in its parish.
2.
The newly re-formed Section, which still needs new members and particularly a standard bearer, looks forward to taking part in the Remembrance Day Service at St. Mary's on Sunday, 14 November - the parade leaves East Street at 10.40 sharp. The same evening a coach will go to the White Rock Pavilion at Hastings for the ceremony there, run on the same lines as that in the Royal Albert Hall - members of the public are welcome to join the group (leaving 5.0 p.m., cost £1.50) by contacting Joan Camier on Rye 2289 or calling at the cycle shop. Mrs. Camier can also arrange transport from Tilling Green and Badger Gate to the Section's monthly meetings at the Red Cross Centre (4th Monday in the month).
Rye Scouts are celebrating the movement's Jubilee (we wonder what it should be called - platinum? - uranium?) at the Community Centre on Thursday, 11 November, from 7.30 to 9.0. The 1st Rye Scouts bear the proud title Captain Cory's Own, and Captain Cory, as well as being a well-known Rye resident, was one of Baden-Powell's helpers on Brownsea Island at the beginning of the Scout movement. All Old Scouts are invited to come along, and Queen's Scout Award certificates will be presented. It would help if those intending to be present first contact Peter Dee at 108 Udimore Road (Rye 3694).
Desk staff at Rye Police Station were a little doubtful at first which of the hilly approaches to Winchelsea is due for closure while a new gas main is laid, starting this week and probably lasting up to six weeks; but enquiries revealed that it is Strand Hill, the road involving a sharp left uphill turn as one approaches the town and with every opportunity for a collision under the arch. The new gas main will run from Sea Road to the bottom of Sandrock Hill, but the rest of the work can apparently be done without road closures.
We very much hope that Segas's progress will be more satisfactory than that of Southern Water in Udimore Road, where they have now started digging up again the trench which has already meant traffic lights and attendant generator at the bottom of the hill for a month. Apparently, the soil had "settled" more than they had allowed for, but SWA's Mr. Tucker assures the GAZETTE that this time it is purely a topping-up operation and should not take long. He adds, as some consolation, that they are not now finding it necessary to go right up the hill, so once the re-surfacing is complete, they will finally depart. We hope.
The Mayor is calling a public meeting at the Town Hall on Monday (6 November) at 7.30, to seek support for this very good cause. The aim is to form a sub-committee of the Hastings and East Rother branch of the Association, and as there is already considerable local if unco-ordinated support for the cause it should be by no means impossible to achieve. Mr. Simpson invites anyone interested in guide dogs to come along.
Five French yachts arrived at the Strand on Saturday, staying the night and competing in the Rye Harbour Sailing Club's final race of the season on Sunday morning. The Frenchmen came from the Club Nautique de la Baie de la Somme, whose members sent a much larger invasion force earlier in the summer, and entente cordiale is firmly established between the two clubs. Rye yachtsmen plan a return invasion next season.
By now most people in Rye will know of the Stowmarket Schools' Concert Band, whose regular summer visit to the town gives such pleasure (in 1983 they will come on 9-10 July). However, Derek Cable, their conductor, writes that they are giving a concert at Bexhill Parish Church (St. Peter's in the Old Town) on Saturday, 20 November, at 7.30, when all the members of the band will be taking part; they will be including in the programme music played on their very recent concert tour in North Germany. It would be pleasant, he says, if some of their "Rye relatives" were able to come over to Bexhill for a reunion?
3.
The exhibition which opened on Saturday for three weeks contains work by Fairlight artist and RSA member Mary Dinsdale, Elizabeth Cramp of the Royal Watercolour Society, and engraver Arthur Neal. Mary Dinsdale is showing work perhaps rather startling to those who know her previous line drawings, a roomful of colourful writhing nudes in surprising juxtaposition and, one might think, a little unnerving for the desk staff seated among them. Upstairs, Arthur Neal has flower pictures, a series of modern-style engravings entitled "Stripper", plus a delightful romantic nude in a quite different tradition which he calls "Jane in the Orchard". Yet more people, though less nude, go about their business in Elizabeth Cramp's watercolours in the front of the gallery; she has several remarkable scenes of Welsh ecclesiastical life, including a churchyard wine-tasting in aid of the Roof Fund, clearly showing that Welsh home-made wine is every bit as misleading as the Sussex variety. An interesting exhibition, and a complete contrast to the two craft shows which preceded it at the gallery.
Working hard to prepare a Rye shop for its reopening are Peter and Virginia Sowle. Last used for the sale of reproduction furniture, the little shop in Ferry Road has stood empty and forlorn for some time. The Sowles are naming it "Crafty" and they hope it will provide an outlet for the many talented people who make things in their homes. In charge will be Mrs. Sowle's mother, Mrs. Marjorie Rust of Tower Street, and although they do not expect to open for a week or two, the family will be very pleased to hear now from anyone with goods to sell (on a sale-or-return basis, at least to begin with). The idea is to have a wide variety of things for sale, with the "manufacturers" able to try out new ideas without having to commit themselves to making vast quantities of the same thing. The Sowles come from Buckinghamshire and will bring some of their stock from workers there, but the enterprise should benefit local people, not only sellers but also buyers with a new browsing-place for Christmas shopping.
When it was decided last year - with much regret but bowing to the march of progress - that the Rye Benefit Building Society should be merged with the Eastbourne Mutual Building Society, Rye director Alan Webb was invited to join the Board at Eastbourne. It was also agreed that a special committee should be set up, once the merger was complete, to discuss and advise on specifically Rye matters, in order to preserve Rye's interests in the much larger Society. Mrs. Pulford, Branch Manageress at Rye, reports that this Rye Committee last month held the first of its regular quarterly meetings; the members are Alan Webb and R F Howard of William Dawes & Co., with Mr. G. Ferguson from the Eastbourne end. The merger has proceeded smoothly, and the administrative procedures are now complete. Certainly, the remodelled Rye office looks most impressive, though we do miss the familiar name on the fascia board.
We are glad to record that The Apothecary's Shop is now restored to full commercial life with the opening of the Rye office of Michael Farbrother & Partners in the small corner shop - complete, of course, with the legendary fittings. This gives Rye a fourth estate agent. Mrs. Enid Oates, of Winchelsea Beach, is in charge of the office, which will be open from 9-6 on weekdays and 10-4 on Saturdays. (The phone number will conveniently become "triple two triple seven" when our new exchange adds 22 to all our numbers next year.).
From this new office Mr. Farbrother will obviously hope to concentrate on houses in the Rye area, which he reckons to go as far afield as New Romney; but he feels that many of the houses offered for sale by his Hastings office in the Old Town are of a type that may appeal to the discerning buyer house-hunting round Rye, as well as being (house for house) cheaper. He says that Hastings Old Town has a character and charm which relate it more to Rye than to the more modern end of the resort - a point echoing conclusions drawn by Barry Funnell in a WEA / Museum Association lecture last winter.
The Apothecary's Shop - James Kimber's bit this time - also figures in the planning lists; however, Mr. Kimber's application for an illuminated hanging sign was deferred at last Thursday's Planning meeting. Also deferred for further consideration was the application to use the Colebrook's building on the Strand for a car accessories shop, involving alterations to the outside of the building as well as change of use permission.
4.
Thursday, 4th Coffee morning, Town Hall, in aid of Mary Warren memorial, 10.30 Christian Lunch Club, Community Centre, 12.0 for 12.30: speaker Miss Arlynn Timmer of TransWorld Radio, "Dare to Listen".
Friday, 5th Vidlers' monthly auction sale (view Thursday afternoon), 10.0
Papa Joe's film: "Gregory's Girl", Pizzeria, 9.0.
Saturday, 6th Coffee morning for East Sussex Fund for the Blind, FEC, 10.0
Jumble Sale, Rye Fire Station, 2.
Martello Bookshop, Nicholas Mosley signs his new book, 12-1.0
Monday, 8th Guide Dogs for the Blind meeting, Town Hall, 7.30 (see p. 2).
• We are pleased to report that the GAZETTE is now registered as a newspaper (see foot of page); we feel that this guarantee of respectability is well worth £5 a year, but it also means that if we suddenly decide to swamp the news content with advertising, you can complain to the Head Postmaster at Hastings. The paper now goes regularly to Coast to Coast (TVS), so if you have anything special coming up do please let us know well ahead so that it will get through to them in plenty of time.
• £55 was raised at the recent Baptist. Church coffee morning and mini-market; the money goes towards missionary work.
• Takings at the RNLI coffee morning and sale were £250, thanks to the Community Centre's generosity in giving free use of the hall, and to the enthusiasm of the helpers and guests. (Our promised report on the inshore lifeboat's season will appear very shortly.)
• Proceeds of the Church of England Children's Society annual wine and cheese party, held at the Town Hall on 27 October, were over £525. This sum includes a number of donations - one of them in memory of Miss Christine Philpott, an active supporter of the Society's work until her death in August, from her friends and colleagues at British Rail, Beckenham. Succeeding Mr. James Bateman as Secretary is Mrs. Maundrell, of St. Mary's Rectory, while Mrs. Bateman continues as Treasurer.
• Advertisements are due to be placed this week for a part-time assistant to the Town Clerk, the job mentioned in the GAZETTE recently. Applicants must be able to type, and ability to handle figures will be an advantage; pay will be £1.75 an hour, twelve hours a week.
• Rye Racers could have done with more support for their open evening at the Crown Hotel on Sunday, since the beautiful quality of the films shown, of the last eight years of silly races, deserved a wider audience; cameraman was Denis Leeds-George of East Guldeford.
• Junior Club's Hallowe'en party went with a swing, the hall swarming with witches warlocks, wizards and ghosts. Boys' fancy dress was won by Andrew Stoodley, who had dressed up as a Second World War soldier to illustrate "Ghost of Times Past" (a little heart-rending, one judge thought this to be) and the Girls' by Linda Stoodley as a witch with a deliciously horrifying nose and a well-wielded broomstick.
• Two thefts: timber from waste ground at The Deals, and sweets and a radio from the Tollgate Garage. Rye Police would be glad of help from anyone who has bought (or been invited to buy) in the last few weeks an "Alvima" calor-gas mobile room-heater; it is just possible that this might provide a clue to the assailant of Mr. Nelke at Iden.
THE RYE GAZETTE is registered as a newspaper at the Post Office. It is published by' Mrs. Mary Owen, 94 Udimore Road, Rye (Rye 2303) assisted by Mrs. Joan Parkes, Bridge Place, Rye. We are always glad to receive news items for inclusion in this weekly paper - normal deadline is Monday afternoon, though minor alterations can be made by phoning Rye 2303 between 8.0 and 9.0 on Tuesday morning.The GAZETTE costs 20p a week and is normally delivered to subscribers on Wednesday.
Photocopied by Sussex Secretarial Services, 11 Claremont, Hastings (942 2633).