Telling stories on the barrow

Dr Cleal, hearing C-H-M's appeal for more material, has emerged from hiding, blinking into the light and very kindly sent C-H-M this picture. She writes "... at some time in the 80s, I think after your time but I may be wrong, we started going to sit on the top of Crippets long barrow in the field next to Ullenwood, usually after we'd been to the pub (strange, that). This is an occasion in 1984 and the protaganists are from left front clockwise : I'm afraid unknown (or forgotten on my part), Julian Thomas (now Professor Thomas, University of Manchester), Clive Anderson, Nicky Snashall, Clare Milroy, Julie Lancley, Simon (help - have temporarily forgotten his surname) [Figg? Ed.], self, Dave Southwood (Biggles). We certainly did this on more than one occasion and I've since looked up Crippets in the 1920s volume on Gloucestershire long barrows by the well known field archaeologist O.G.S.Crawford in which he notes that there is evidence of some antiquarian activity - well, we should have recognised that, as we were sitting with our feet in the remains of the 'dig' - but I'm not sure that did occur to us (except perhaps to Julian!). If you're putting stuff on line you can mention that Nicky (usually 'Nick' now) and I now work for the National Trust at Avebury where we recreate, as far as is possible, the ambience of the CH finds and planning huts - all we lack is Corky to keep us in order."

To which Dr Ferris muses: "Oh, the youth of today thinking they invented everything-the jet engine, alcohol, cyber-sex, the wireless, pot noodles, sitting on Crippets barrow at night etc. I remember some splendid late night, GL-fuelled,ghost-story-telling sessions on the barrow in 1976 and 1978, the latter being my opportunity to reveal my strange experience with the ghost of a miner encountered in County Durham. And I wasn't making it up." How much GL had you had when you met the miner?

The bucket hut builder

Another Rebecca Chambers shot of the 1988 sequence in which other people watch Steve Vaughan constructing the hut to keep the buckets. John Gale and Joanne Milroy supervise ...

Was the Below Average White Band ahead of its time?

Joanne Milroy has had a fascinating item pop into her inbox. She writes:

"Dear Julian,

See below a news release from the government's recycling bods. Don't ask why in the course of my working day I am exposed to this sort of thing - I know it isn't good for me.

But the big question is ....is this a secret reformation of the Below Average White Band or just another demonstration that our most favourite popular music combination was so ground-breaking it has taken the rest of the world 30 years to catch up?

Joanne


December 03, 2009
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


WASTE ELECTRICAL 'INSTRUMENTS' TO ENCOURAGE GADGET-GRIPPED BRITONS TO RECYCLE

With the UK public predicted to spend £7.3bn on electricals in the run up to Christmas this year, a new survey from Recycle Now (http://www.recyclenow.com ) has revealed that more than a third of us (35 per cent) still believe we can't recycle the small electrical and electronic goods we are replacing, such as kettles, games consoles, phones and garden power tools.

But with 80 per cent saying we'd make more effort to recycle if we knew we could, Recycle Now is teaming up with The Really Rubbish Orchestra and BBC Last Choir Standing finalists Hear Me Now! on 1 December for a special concert in Covent Garden to raise awareness that small waste electricals do have value and can be recycled.

Recycle Now's latest survey of 1,500 UK adults reveals that just under 30 per cent of us - particularly young people and women - simply throw broken or unwanted items away in the rubbish, whereas if we switched to recycling these items we could divert over 100,000 tonnes of valuable waste electricals from landfill each year, weighing the equivalent of 14,000 double decker buses.

The survey also indicates that people over 35 are 50 per cent more likely than those under 35 to have recycled at least one small electrical item, and men are almost 20 per cent more likely than women. But despite the hundreds of recycling collection centres that are able to receive waste electronics, a staggering 41 per cent of people have never recycled a small appliance in their life even though almost a third of respondents changed their kettle in the past twelve months (29 per cent) and one in four swapped mobile phones (25 per cent).

With the UK population projected to spend £7.3bn in total, or £144 per head, on electricals in the last quarter of this year alone, there is an urgent need to raise awareness about the possibilities of recycling electronic waste, especially over the Christmas period when many of us will receive new goods to replace broken or unwanted items.

In this unique event designed to encourage more of us to recycle our old unwanted or broken small electrical goods this season, Hear Me Now! will perform carols accompanied by The Really Rubbish Orchestra playing a number of unique, electronic instruments that have been built out of electronic waste such as an old telephone receiver, a walkman and a computer scanner. The aim of the event is to highlight that broken or unwanted items are not just waste - they have a value and can be recycled into other useful items.

Maurice Cairnduff, co-founder of the Really Rubbish Orchestra said: "We are delighted to be able to use our expertise to help Recycle Now raise awareness about recycling electrical waste in a fun and creative way. It is quite amazing what you can make from very little. We are really looking forward to the gig and hope people will come down to support us and Recycle Now's campaign."

Gerrard Fisher from Recycle Now said: "Our aim is to inform people in a fun way how and where to recycle their small electricals. At Christmas and New Year many of us choose to buy new appliances, or receive them a gifts and don't know what to do with the old ones.

"The Recycle Now website is a fantastic resource with useful information on how and what to recycle. It also has a helpful postcode finder, which locates all the recycling facilities in your area, and a list showing which retailers take back old electrical goods. All the information is available on the website, and we are hoping that the Really Rubbish experience will get people in the festive spirit but also raise awareness and encourage more of us to recycle our electrical waste over the Christmas period and into the future."

To find out more about recycling in the UK including what you can recycle and where to recycle, please visit the Recycle Now website on www.recyclenow.com/electricals


- ends -


NOTES FOR EDITORS

Background to the survey:
The survey for Recycle Now was carried out online by Opinion Matters between 12/11/ 2009 and 18/11/2009 amongst a nationally representative sample of 1514 UK adults aged 16+. Opinion Matters adheres to and follows the codes of the MRS (Market Research Society) and are fully registered and compliant with the Data Protection Registrar.

Survey headlines:
o A 1/3 of people (35%) believe electrical goods can't be recycled
o Men are more likely to know that waste electricals can be recycled than women (71% to 61%)
o Older people are more likely to recognise that electricals can be recycled than young people (16-24: 58%; 25-34: 63%; 35-44: 64%; 45-55: 65%; 55+: 67%)
o 28% of people with broken or replaced small electrical items typically throw them away in the bin with their rubbish
o 41% of people have never recycled an electrical item
o Women are more likely than men to have never recycled an electrical item (45% to 35%); conversely, men are more likely than women to have recycled at least one electrical item (65% to 55%)
o Young people are more likely to have never recycled an electrical item than older people (16-24: 67%; 25-34: 58%; 35-44: 40%; 45-55: 36%; 55+: 34%)
o More than a third of people (35%) say they don't know where to take electricals to be recycled
o Kettle and mobile phones top the list for goods that have been replaced in the past year (29% of people have replaced a kettle and 25% a mobile phone)
o Women are slightly more likely to just throw away electricals goods in their rubbish than men (30% compared with 26%)
o 83% would make more of an effort to recycle electricals in the future having been made aware they could

Latest Environment Agency data on recycling small electricals:
Latest figures indicate that as of June 2009, 1.27 million tonnes of electricals were bought in the UK. Of these figures, 480,000t of the electricals bought were small items (irons, kettles, games consoles, hair straighteners, computers, electric hedge trimmers etc) and 70,000t was collected for recycling, which is 14.5%.

Christmas retail predictions:
Verdict report - UK Retail: Christmas 2009 forecast - what's in store?

Waste electrical instruments developed by The Really Rubbish Orchestra
o Plank/skateboard slide guitar and practice amplifier (telephone / portable tape / computer speakers)
o Scanner pianner (computer scanner and waste metal instrument tuned in the key of C (for Chaos!))
o Amplified drums (audio cabinet speakers and amplifier)
o Vocals microphone & stand (internal computer speaker and ex-office lighting standard lamp)
o Percussion (computer keyboard)
o Cuica (Brazilian friction drum) (electric kettle)
o The Really Rubbish Orchestra 'bandemonium' music composition environment (all the above plus walkman tape players, portable cd players, computer speakers, toy keyboard, electronic toy)
o Guitar amplifier, lesley speaker & spring reverb (domestic audio amp, music centre cabinet, record deck, car audio speakers, electronic packaging waste, internal computer speakers, hairdryer heating element, portable tape player, metal computer cabinet)

Recycle Now and WRAP:
1 WRAP helps individuals, businesses and local authorities to reduce waste and recycle more, making better use of resources and helping to tackle climate change.
2 Established as a not-for-profit company in 2000, WRAP is backed by government funding from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
3 Working in seven key areas (Construction, Retail, Manufacturing, Organics, Business Growth, Behavioural Change, and Local Authority Support), WRAP's work focuses on market development and support to drive forward recycling and materials resource efficiency within these sectors, as well as wider communications and awareness activities including the multi-media national Recycle Now campaign for England.
4 Recycle Now is a campaign to encourage people in England to recycle more things more often. Six out of ten of us now describe ourselves as committed recyclers, compared to less than half of us when the campaign began in 2004.
5 More information on all of WRAP's programmes can be found on www.wrap.org.uk and for more information on the Recycle Now campaign visit www.recyclenow.com"

Priceless. I think Dr Phillpotts thought of, and played, much of this stuff many years ago. Perhaps he should get a commission?

What on earth is going on out there?

The late, great Fred Trueman, possibly the finest fast bowler ever to play for England, after he retired from first-class cricket, became a summariser for Test Match Special which broadcasts England games. Whenever events on the field either angered him or mystified him (a relatively frequent occurrence), there would be an audible sigh or harrumph, followed by "I don't understand it. What on earth is going on out there?" delivered in his unmistakable Yorkshire accent. Fred's catch-phrase sprang to mind when I found this photograph in the Chronicler's 1985 selection. It shows Steve Vaughan and Joanne Milroy in a picture as the caption for which, for some obscure reason, Dr Phillpotts has inscribed "Steve and Joanne simulate 'Naughty Time'. Was it because he caught Steve half way through removing his waterproof trousers after the rain? Why is Steve brandishing a belt like a whip? I think Fred had it right: what on earth is going on out there ...

Holst & Crickley?

Joanne Milroy writes: "I have been away on holiday but the day before I set off I was brushing my teeth to the sound of the Today programme on a Friday morning when a news item popped up about about a newly-discovered piece of archive film featuring the Cheltenham born composer Gustav Holst. Apparently Holst was an eccentric figure, and the radio item reported how once he was chased away by a local farmer after he spent the day on the top of a nearby Gloucestershire hill top practising his trombone. The farmer apparently complained how the noise worried his cow.

I was just thinking, while still brushing my teeth, whether the said hill top might be Crickley, when the Chair of the Holst Birthplace Trust was introduced. It turned out to be none other than Marjorie Imlah, well known among many Crickley-ites from the mid 1980s-early 1990s vintage, as the manager of the GLOSCAT Crickley "Project".

Richard Savage and others will have to fill you in on the "project" work. I was never quite sure of the purpose- although I do recall expeditions transporting vast quantities of finds and scrunging material either from the hill to the 'Project' or from the 'Project' back to the hill. I can't even remember where the Project was located although I seem to recall it was near Travis Perkins, the builders merchants where we often used to go for advance weekend mending and renovation kit. I think Waitrose has now nicely sanitised this part of Cheltenham now.

I seem to remember JP had various touching terms of endearment for the project and various personalities connected with it. The Project did spawn the yellow peril bus and there was a lovely lady called Liz, who was Marjorie's deputy and often drove the bus around the district to schools and other destinations to spread the Word about Crickley.

Perhaps Richard and Phil can provide more detail?"

It was over there ... or was it over there? No, I'm sure it was over there ... I think ...

Crickley Hill Man had the good fortune to be in the right place at the right time to capture this rather lovely sequence as Ros Cleal and Marion Barter piece together what happened where during the picnic on 4 July 2009. Were they started on their train of thought by Iain Ferris in the top picture? Iain points Julie-Ann Morrison south east. Marion goes for north east: Ros nearly joins her at north north east and then they both agree and head south east.

Also in shot, Jill Hummerstone, John Parry, Les Capon, Chris Phillpotts, John Boden, Kate and Tony Dumycz and Joanne Milroy.

The Franco-Iranian representatives: 1980

Maryam Ghaffari and Elsa Charlot came to Crickley Hill for at least three seasons between 1979 and 1981 and various friends of theirs accompanied them: the main photograph in this collage shows Maryam and Marine with their post holes.  The other shots show Maryam with Clive Anderson in the background, Maryam and Elsa together, with Maryam resting on her friend Arnelle, and Elsa relaxing in Cheltenham and during a tea break.  All these shots come from Dr Phillpotts's 1980 collection.  In the shot of Maryam and Elsa together in the background can be detected Steve Vaughan, Joanne Milroy, Mike Adams and Dan Johnson.

Steve's and Joanne's wedding 1990

Do diggers scrub up nicely? Judge for yourself from Steve and Joanne's wedding in May 1990 "with a crowd of reprobate gatecrashers. Left to Right Arwel, PWD, me, Jock Bruce, Joanne, John Gale, Julie Gale, Noakesie, Sue, Ros, Nikki, Chris Gingell, Dr K."  Yes ...

Which open weekend was this?

Joanne Milroy has been digging in the family archive.  "Working through my father's not insignificant photo archive (unsurprising as he was a photographer by trade) I have come across a few Crickley shots ( some of which I enclose).  My parents were quite regular visitors to Open Weekend, usually parking their caravan at Mike Cuttell's Ullenwood Court site. 

 
The first two pictures seem to be of an Open Weekend during a later season.  Certainly either an Open Weekend or weekend site tour, although if it was an Open Weekend I would have expected more 'attractions' around the dig encampment such as a tea tent or an iron age cooking display!  I still have the Stone Age Snack Bar sign which we used on a couple of occasions."

 I'd quite forgotten that there was a period when the information boards were fixed into the ground within the interior of the fort: they provided a convenient barrier for Phil to lean on and address the assembled multitude of grockles!
 

Cutting AXV 1979 - the site tour for the diggers ...

This must have been well towards the end of the season when Cutting AXV was more or less finished: fine view of the Period 3(b?) wall and gangbreak. It really is a magnificent piece of construction. Those listening to the Dixon commentary include Joanne Milroy, Ranging Rod, Rowena Dutton and Training...

Experimental archaeology 1

I will have to rely on those present (L to R Joanne Milroy, John Gale, Steve Vaughan, ?, Ros Cleal, Rebecca Chambers & Arwel Barrett) to give an account of the objectives and the achievements of this tableau from the Phillpotts archive, as I was not around: Chris thinks this was 1988 or 1989. So what were you all up to? Carving? Chiselling? Firing pots? Baking potatoes?