We do apologise for this emergency edition of the GAZETTE, but it has been a very thin week for news anyway. The Editor is now installed at 2 Cyprus Place, all the furniture is out of the garden and it is possible for a thin person to get into the garage. But the builders are still busy, though we hope to be back to normal with a full-size paper next week (no. 94).
There will be no GAZETTE on 8 August nor on 22 August, when the Editor will be on holiday; no. 95 will appear on 15 August and no. 96 on 29 August, after which we shall be publishing weekly as usual.
The Rye, Winchelsea and District Branch of the RNLI is proud to announce a record amount of £2,044 raised during Lifeboat Week from the house-to-house and street collections. The committee would like to thank the collectors and the generous givers who made this possible.
All honour to the Friends of Rye Art Gallery, who have been first off the mark to arrange a visit to the restored Camber Castle. This is a fund-raising event, open to the first 40 people who buy £l tickets now available at the Easton Rooms. The visit takes place on Thursday afternoon of next week, 2 August, and the group will meet at the Castle at 2.45 for 3. In charge will be Jeremy Coad, Inspector of Ancient Monuments for the South East; Mr. Coad is on the staff of the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission, the new name for the branch of the D o E which is responsible for the Castle, and he has lectured twice recently in Rye on local monuments.
This will be a rare opportunity for those who enjoyed Paddy Aiken's photographs at the library in May to see for themselves the reality. There is no car access, and visitors will have to approach on foot, either by the shortest route from the Rye Harbour Road (the footpath just beyond the sluice) or from the Winchelsea Beach end (the sharp bend in Sea Road). But, if the weather is at all helpful, it would be a lovely place for a picnic tea afterwards?
We would like to congratulate General Sir Charles Jones, GCB, CBE, MC, and Lady Jones on their golden wedding on 10 July. The actual day was celebrated by a party at Chelsea Hospital of which Sir Charles is a former Governor. However, as well as being a past President of the National British Legion, Sir Charles is now President of the Rye Branch and Lady Jones is President of the Rye Women's Section, and the Legion was certainly not going to let the occasion pass unnoticed in the town. At a reception on 18 July at the British Legion Club, Sir Charles and Lady Jones were presented with a suitably inscribed plate made by Rye Pottery, which brought with it the good wishes and congratulations of all the Rye Legion members.
The Police Station press book this week records the theft of £130 from an elderly couple at Camber - not normally a story for the GAZETTE, but it holds a warning.
A man came to the door of their home, claiming to be from the water board and showing some kind of card. They took him upstairs at his request to inspect the supply, and while they were thus occupied the man's accomplice slipped into the house and stole the money.
Please, please, scrutinise very carefully indeed any card offered by a stranger as proof of identity; if you are doubtful, you can check back by phone with the organisation concerned before letting him (or her) into the house. If you suggest this and he makes off, phone the police instead!
2.
Mrs. Gina Ciccone, of Cinque Ports Street, died in hospital on Sunday. The time of the funeral has yet to be announced.
Rye is twice honoured by the Royal Academy next month. Arrangements have been made to display in St. Mary's the replica (by John Larson) of the Tondo, the circular marble carving by Michelangelo which is the Royal Academy's greatest treasure. The subject is the Madonna and Child with St. John the Baptist - he is the patron saint of Florence, and it was in Florence that Michelangelo carved the piece in 1501-5 before he moved to Rome. The original was left to the Academy in the early nineteenth century and is now on permanent display in Burlington House. People who were sorry not to find the replica Tondo on show at the Rye Art Gallery during the current exhibition there, as some had expected, will now have the chance to see it in more suitable surroundings at St. Mary's.
Its arrival in Rye is celebrated by a recital at St. Mary's on Saturday, 4 August, at 7.30. This is the third in a series of provincial recitals given under the auspices of the Friends of the Royal Academy by the principal oboe of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, John Anderson, with Simon Wynberg (guitar). The programme includes music by Ibert, Satie, J S Bach, Napoleon Coste, Tom Eastwood and Felix White; we would like to tell readers more about the last three but our reference book doesn't mention them - Ibert and Satie are followers of Ravel, and J S Bach needs no programme note. Tickets are £3 (£2.50 for Friends of the RA or the RAG, pensioners and students) and may be obtained in advance from the Easton Rooms - and, we would imagine, at the door on the night.
Vickie Piper tells us that her Mentally Handicapped Society committee will be running a charity shop from 6 August for four weeks, the first two in the former Sussex Express office next to the Post Office and the second two (from 20 August) in the bus yard kiosk. They are most grateful to the Post Office and to the Hastings and District Bus Company respectively for their kindness in allowing this use of their properties. The shop will be open from 10 to 12 and 2 to 4 except on Sundays (and they are not committing themselves yet about Tuesday afternoons).
Mrs. Piper has enough goods for sale to begin with, but as soon as the Cinque Ports Street shop opens there will be a poster in its window about further supplies (both shops are very small, so they cannot cope with furniture). What they do need now is offers of help with selling, and Mrs. Piper is now working out a rota; anyone who could spare two hours just once during the four weeks would be welcome.
The money raised will go towards buying equipment for the holiday playgroup which is the society's first project; they have now heard that they can use the Hill House School premises for this - Chief Education Officer, many thanks! - but arrangements cannot be completed in time for this summer. However, they hope to open during the autumn half-term week.
It seems no time at all since we reported from Thomas Peacocke School on the success in an Oxo cookery competition of Gussie Mathews of Leasam Farm. Since then, Gussie has been to college and turned a talent into a profession, and now she is back in Rye starting up her own catering service. Special celebration cakes for all occasions are made to order (about a week's notice is appreciated, though rush jobs are not impossible), and Gussie will also cook for your party or for your freezer. She is now working in the Spar shop in Cinque Ports Street, where she can discuss clients' requirements and where one of her cakes is on display - or ring her at home.
When the SWA invited the press to see the new sluice at Star Lock, they provided refreshments - and who made them? Gussie; and they were absolutely delicious. This is an unsolicited testimonial!
3.
Miss Allen retired on Friday after thirty years teaching at Thomas Peacocke School, which she leaves as a Deputy Head as well as Senior Mistress. Replacing her as a Deputy Head is a newcomer, Mr. Stephen Walker, and Miss Getley becomes Senior Mistress.
Win Allen went to Rye Grammar School as a very new pupil in 1933. By the time the school evacuated to Bedford, she was Head Girl; she went on to do an Honours degree in English at Reading University, followed by a teacher-training course. Her first job was back in Rye, half a term's "temping" at the New Road school; but this was followed by five years at Leiston Grammar School in Suffolk, and another five at Downer Grammar School, Harrow. Then she returned to Rye to teach English at the Grammar School in the days when Donald Darby was Head of the English Department and Miss Edith Turner was Senior Mistress, and the opening of the Leasam establishment called for extra staff. Much later, Miss Allen went back to New Road for a year to teach there as a preliminary to the full installation of the comprehensive system in Rye. Senior Mistress at Thomas Peaoocke for many years, Miss Allen became a Deputy Head when the admin was reorganised some eight years ago. Less recent pupils at the school will remember her work with the school plays, and she was a long-standing member of the PTA Committee.
In his end-of-term newsletter, the Head says: "I am sure that no-one will consider amiss if I pay a special tribute to Miss Allen who has served this school so well over the past thirty years. There are hundreds who owe her a debt of gratitude for her excellent teaching which helped so many students to good examination results and gave them a deep appreciation of literature which they will carry for life. In addition, she has shown much wisdom as a form and House teacher and as Deputy Head in dealing with the sensitive pastoral problems that have to be faced in a school. She has always done everything possible to help her students. We will miss her greatly and offer best wishes for a long and exciting retirement, and we thank her for her outstanding service and friendship."
Exciting or not, Miss Allen tells us that her immediate aim for her retirement is to do one thing at a time instead of half-a-dozen all at once!
Mrs. Joy Lofthouse also retires this month as Head of the TPS Remedial Department. Mrs. Lofthouse came to the school 9 ½ years ago, when the remedial teaching was rather less structured than it is now; she was in charge of the Lower School remedial classes, but when the subject gained its own Department, she was appointed to head it and saw through many changes. Mr. Spencer takes over as Head of Department, and his wife Joan will be taking the remedial teaching in Lower School. Mrs. Lofthouse's husband Charles, for many years fourth-year teacher at Freda Gardham School, is retiring from the headship of Winchelsea primary school, and the Lofthouses intend to move down to Gloucestershire once they have sold their ex-Icklesham-School home.
Also going a long way from Rye is the Lower School Welfare Assistant, Mrs. Vicky Sanders. She and her family are leaving Camber for Wales. Mrs. Sanders came to Lower School in 1976; before that, she used to run the Iden playgroup, so she was often a familiar face to tearful first-years who took their tummy-aches and bloody knees along to the medical room for the first time. But there was a good deal more to the job than blood and tears; toil and sweat entered into it too, with the second-hand clothes shop, Lower School's book-keeping and other commitments. Mrs. Sanders' successor is to be appointed shortly.
Upper School newsletter contains an appeal from the Head for help from parents - and he assures us, anyone else willing to give up their time - in painting some of the school's tattiest classrooms; ESCC will provide the paint but will not pay the painters. The Head is setting up one team at a time to do one classroom at a time; if you could join in, please contact the school.
Just room to congratulate Ian Turner of Winchelsea Beach, ex-TPS, who has gained a First in his Natural Sciences Tripos at the end of his second year at Cambridge.
4.
Saturday, 28th Methodist Church Annual Sale, Methodist Hall, 10
Coffee morning for Sports Hall, Ti, 10.30 (see GAZETTE no. 92)
Craft Market, FEC, 11 to 5
Monday, 30th WRVS Luncheon Club, CC, 12.30
Tuesday, 31st "Monsters" at Rye Library, 10.30 to 12 (see GAZETTE no. 92)
Wednesday, 1st Conservative Association coffee morning, 47 Fairmeadow, 10.30 Blood donor session, Baptist Hall, 2 to 4, 5 to 8
• Over £600 was taken at the Hill House fete; they could have done without the cloudburst half-way through, says League of Friends secretary Glenda Smith, but at least people went on buying despite the rain.
• Wednesday's Day Centre coffee morning at the Baptist Hall raised £24 for funds and, more important (says Mrs. Barbara Wild, who runs the Centre) it made them some new friends and was enjoyed very much by the members. The occasion was much honoured by the presence of the Mayor and Mayoress.
• £187 went to the National Gardens Scheme and the Red Cross after three Udimore gardens (White Fox Lodge, The Hammonds and Wick Farm) were opened to the public.
• Condolences to Ian Addy of Cooper Road and to Douglas Mowl of Camber, both of whom went to hospital after coming off worst in recent (and quite separate) collisions between their respective mopeds and cars.
• Millers of the High Street will be open on Tuesday mornings (9 to 1) from now until the end of the holiday period.
• The last two planning lists included the following: change of use for the former Farnborough canteen to light industrial use for printing (silk screen and offset litho); a new shop front with non-illuminated fascia and non-illuminated hanging sign for 41 The Mint; repainting Rayners' High Street shop front in black and white; and change of use for three arches under the railway bridge (Military Road side) to workshops and stores, from the Iden owner of the three adjoining arches.
• People in Hastings feel very strongly about the Regional Health Authority's plan to transfer the Radiotherapy Unit from Pembury to Maidstone. We are not sure whether this really makes much difference to Rye people who receive treatment at the Unit, but anyway we have been asked to mention a meeting at the Lower Hall, White Rock, Hastings, on Friday (27th) at 7.30 "to voice public opinion at the decision". Local MPs may or may not be there - we have heard both versions; but if you want to voice your opinion, this is the time and place to do it.
• It is a long time ago since Rother rejected the application to develop land at Nook Beach as a leisure sports area; readers may remember the strong objections from conservationists to such use of land adjoining the Rye Harbour Nature
Reserve. The applicants appealed against the decision, and John Cawdron tells us that the date has now been fixed to hear the appeal (at Rye Harbour Village Hall): 30 October to 2 November, and again on 6 November. He asks us to give long notice of this so that objectors have the maximum time to prepare their case.
• If you were on Camber beach early on Sunday morning, 15 July, and witnessed a serious assault on three men by a group of other men, the police (Rye 222112) would be very glad to hear from you.
• A 19' cabin cruiser, the Carew V, worth £4,000, was stolen from Rye Harbour on 12 or 13 July.
THE RYE GAZETTE is registered as a newspaper with the Post Office, and published by Mrs. Mary Owen from 2 Cyprus Place, Rye (Rye 222303 as before). News items for inclusion are always welcome - deadline Monday afternoon, Tuesday 9 am for emergencies. The GAZETTE (normally twice the size of this issue) costs 25p weekly, and is delivered to subscribers and pick-up points on Wednesday; extra copies and back numbers can be ordered from 2 Cyprus Place, while a few spares are available from Squirrels, 9-13 Cinque Ports Street, Rye. (Copyright Mary Owen 1984)