History at the School 2011

History at the school

Many thanks to those of you who came into the school for a look around during the festival weekend.

Once again there was a lot of interest in "things local", scrapbooks, and photographs always jog memories and the Census returns were well used as more and more people are researching their family history.

Watts Naval School and the railway created lots of interest as did the military display by Mr Claxton. Once again John Gilbert, the historian for the Wendling and Beeston airfield, home to the Americans and the 392nd Bomb Group came for all three days. Well done John, he's become a stalwart now and is someone to be relied on to keep things going.

The Baptism, Wedding and Burial registers also helped to fill a few gaps in family ancestry or just reinforce what people thought they knew. The lives of Mr Robin Don's father and mother in Germany during the 30's also created quite a stir. In case you missed it Air Vice Marshall Francis Don was Military Air Attache in Berlin and had regular meetings with the Nazi leaders including Hitler himself.

Many thanks also to the small army of local friends who did a stint as stewards, without them this exhibition would not be possible.

Finally, a disappointing note, when I came to put the scrapbooks away (they spanned nearly 40 years of Elmham village life culled from local newspapers collected by Mrs Doris Yarham) I discovered that some photographs had been removed as had a number of articles that had been taken out of several books.

If only I had been asked I would gladly have coped whatever was wanted – it is very easy to do today isn't it.

Open Church Week - 2011, Festival News

Open Churches Week (August 6th-14th)– an opportunity to visit all the churches in the Elmham Group following the ‘Benefice Trail’ on a vintage bus.
Perhaps not everyone in Elmham is aware that for 5 years North Elmham parish has been part of a group known as the Elmham Group (or Benefice). This includes Worthing, Billingford, Guist, Twyford and Bintree.

We all have our own churches and services, but support each other and share a rector, Nicholas Varnon. We are fortunate in Elmham that we can keep our church open all the time, but this is not true in some of the other parishes. The church wardens from all the parishes felt it was time we all knew each others’ churches better, so on the first Sunday of Open Churches Week (August 7th) all the churches will be open in the afternoon.

To help us get around, a vintage bus will start from outside Elmham Church at 12 noon and go around the churches. The service will run at half-hourly intervals so you can get on and off at each church as you wish. The last bus will return to Elmham at 5p.m. There will be parking at Elmham and Billingford, Bintree and Worthing and toilets at Elmham and Billingford.

Refreshments will be served at some of the churches.

There will a quiz and souvenir programme available on the bus (price £3). It sounds like a fun afternoon, so do come and encourage friends and family to come along as well.

More locally don’t forget Jazz in the garden on the evening of Saturday 2nd July at the Longhouse (next door to the old bakery). By popular demand the Phoenix Jazz band is returning and we hope for as good an evening as last year. Music starts at 7p.m, tickets £8 at the gate.

Plans for the August Bank Holiday weekend (August 27th-29th) Elmham Festival are also well under way. The flower theme this year is children’s classic stories and no doubt the arrangers will be as creative as ever. There will be the usual attractions as well as delicious refreshments. Offers of books, bric-a-brac, home produce, cakes and raffle prizes are all welcome. New this year will be events on the paddock organised by the Saturday Morning Club and the vintage bus will be running to pick people up through the village. As ever, this involves a lot of work and we are always looking for people to join our team, either working in the planning and coordinating of helpers on stalls, and in the tea room, or just offering a few hours of help on the day. So if you are about that weekend and feel you could help in any way at this community event, please contact Susanna (01362 668435 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ).