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November 2012
Music, dance and ceremony among the month’s Poppy Appeal events LOCAL folk band Poacher's Moon plan to launch their new single 'The Fallen' at a special performance in support of the Poppy Appeal at Blandford Royal British Legion on Friday 2nd November. On Sunday 4th November, representatives of the RBL and Blandford Camp will gather at the war memorial in Blandford Cemetery to lay wreaths both on the memorial and on the war graves, which are being refurbished by the War Graves Commission. On Saturday 10th November a Poppy Dance at the Royal British Legion features Debi 'English Rose' Gregory, who sings 1940s songs in period costume. On Sunday 11th November, Remembrance Day and Armistice Day will be marked across the district and in Blandford by the Royal British Legion Blandford branch parade starting at 2.45pm to the Corn Exchange war memorial, where the laying of wreaths will be followed by a parade round the town and into the parish church for the Remembrance Day service. To bring the Poppy Appeal events to a resounding finale on Saturday 17th November, the Coots Band, consisting of serving soldiers from Blandford Camp, will play at an open night in support of the charity at the Royal British Legion. The RBL's branch AGM will be held at the club on Monday 26th November.
Gallery offers showcase for Bryanston art department
North Dorset District Council chairman Mike Oliver, right, receives the Federation of Small Businesses award from Wessex chairman Ken Moon.
Council rewarded for its efforts to help young people into employment NORTH Dorset District Council's efforts to get young people in the area into employment have been recognised by the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB). The council was presented with the Best Business Friendly Award from the FSB Wessex branch for its innovative WAVE project (Work experience, Apprenticeships, Volunteering, Employment). FSB Wessex regional chairman Ken Moon praised the council for its commitment to small businesses in North Dorset, saying: "This award says 'thank you' to all the councillors and officers who rarely get recognised for the work they do. The FSB looks to the region's local authorities to help create the environment for small businesses to survive and thrive." In answer to concerns about employability skills, work readiness and transition from training and education into employment, the council set up a meeting with schools, trainers and business representatives, and co-ordinated events which included a training and business event in March, a young entrepreneur event in June, and a two-day Careers College event in July. A further event, called a Business and Skills Market Place, is planned for March next year. Students from five North Dorset schools chose from 60 occupational areas, attended vocational workshops to get hands-on experience and learnt about training and education opportunities at a careers fair. More than 90 per cent of them said it helped them make decisions about the future and better understand the skills needed to get work, and 72 per cent felt more confident about the future.
ARTIST Annabelle Valentine is hosting an exhibition in her Salisbury Street gallery of work by staff from Bryanston School art department. It ends on 4th November - so hurry! Artists showing are Jack Dickson, Anthony Connelly, Caroline Chourou, Helen Dean, Jindra Jehu, Mike Owens, Mark Hilde, Sue Macpherson and Monica Sinclair-Smith. Annabelle says she has received an astonishing number of new orders since opening her Valentine Gallery in May this year. Her works in progress include a 12-ft long painting depicting the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, and a large painting of the racehorse Canford Cliffs, ridden by Richard Hughes. The jockey rode into the history books when he won seven races in a day at Windsor on 15th October, equalling Frankie Dettori’s record.
Bigger bungalow PLANS to more than double the size of a bungalow in Salisbury Road by turning it into a twostorey house have encountered objections from neighbours and Blandford Town Council. Two residents attended the town council's October planning meeting to complain that it would rob them of light and privacy by overlooking their properties in Dairy Field. The planning application by Mr Hardiman is being considered by North Dorset District Council.
Ian Taylor, a true man of Blandford, dies at 87 FRIENDS, colleagues and family members from across the country gathered in Blandford Parish Centre to remember Ian Taylor, a Blandford man who died while visiting family in the United States. He was 87. Mr Taylor was a founder member and subsequently vice-chairman of the Blandford branch of the University of the Third Age, a town guide and minutes secretary for Blandford and District Civic Society, a member of the Dorset group of the Institute of Advanced Motorists, a committee member of the Old Blandfordians Association, a founder member of the Blandford Railway Arches Trust and a volunteer with Blandford Museum. He was the son of Robert Taylor and Lois Strachan, and educated at Blandford Grammar School, where he was head boy in
1941-2, and St Peter's Hall, Oxford University, where his studies in French and German from 1942 to 1950 were broken by service with the RAF from 1943-47. He rowed in the college 1st VIII in 1948-9, and went on to earn an MA and Dip. Ed to become a teacher in secondary schools and then a lecturer in modern languages at Leicester College of Education until, following early retirement, he became a supply teacher. A leading light in the British Association for Language Teaching, and treasurer of the Modern Language Association, he was external examiner and vice-president of the Leicester French Circle, and an officer with the Audio-Visual Language Association. He had married his wife Elly, from Alsace, in 1949, and they had five sons and a daughter.
They always planned when they retired to replace the house in Blandford, built by Mr Taylor's father, in which he and his sister Anthea grew up. When Elly died in 1987, Mr Taylor started building the four-bedroom timber house in Kings Road with the help of his son-in-law, children, nephews and friends. In 1999 he married Norma Jean Eiben Walters, a retired psychology lecturer from the USA, whom he and his late wife had known in Oxford in the 1950s, and she joined him in Blandford. He is survived by her and by his six children, nine grandchildren and a greatgranddaughter from his first marriage. Donations are being made in his memory to Water Aid or to a language prize at The Blandford School.