4 minute read
Memories of Frenze Thelveton
Local historian, Dennis Cross from Diss, shares with us his fascinating collection of old postcards, focusing on a different village in every issue. This time, we take a walk down memory lane in Frenze and Thelveton.
Early 1Early 1914 914 – s soldiers foldiers from therom the StaffordStaffordshireshire Yeomanry butchering meat for the troops in Frenze.
The Staffordshire Yeomanry was stationed at Frenze during WW1, where they trained before shipping off to France. Here they can be seen in early 1914 with their horses, in a picture taken by official war photographer Ernest Abraham.
Seen here in 1911, S St Andrews Church, F Frenze, i is situated in beautiful surroundings and excellent for brass rubbings. Frenze Hall is situated opposite the church, and was owned at the time of this 1912 postcard by farmer Arthur Gaze. The population was 49.
The ETh Elizabethanli b th mansioni Thelveton HTh l t Hal ll, l in i 1914, was owned by Sir Edward Mann Bart JP. Many Agatha Christie TV programmes have been filmed here.
Pictured in 1911, this splendid house, called The Grange, was owned by Horace Willam Lascelles. Below right: Taken in the late 1920s, this photograph shows the school house, which was built by Mr T Mann for 48 pupils. The school is now a private house.
Thelveton School, around 1927/28. Dennis Cross went to school with many of the children of these pupils!
Back row l-r: Margaret Kent, Peter Potter, Will Kent, John Moore, Charlie Ruddock, Miss Meadows. 2nd row l-r: Mrs Smith (headmistress) ), Joan Sneesby, Sybil Lawrence, Bert Saunders, Frank Coulson, Freda Kerry, Violet Lawrence, Kath Emptage, Brenda Lawrence, Miss Cook (infant teacher), Marjorie Lawrence. Seated l-r: Dorothy Potter, Edna Lipson, Marjorie Race, Winnie Leeder, Vera Ruddock, Lily Saunders, Joan Smith, Miss Meadows, Ivy Coulson. On ground l-r: Sanford Race, Gerald Ruddock, Herbert Kent, Kenny Ruddock.
The Norfolk Postcard Club has been disbanded, and a donation of £430 has been sent to each of four charities; East Anglian Air Ambulance, Big C, Marie Curie Care, and Marie Curie Support.
A moment in time
Our postcard expert Dennis Cross is unveiling his fourth calendar to raise money for Norfolk cancer charity Big C. The popul , which feature fascinating histor postcards of local villages, have raised £6,340 so far for the charity, and Dennis is confident that this latest one will be just as well received.
“This is a calendar with a difference,” he says. “It goes from January 2023 to January 2024 and features four postcards per page. We have sought out the most unusual and interesting ones from Diss and surrounding villages, many of which are unique and never seen before. But some readers will recognise the scenes and places, and that’s what makes the calendars so
lar calendars rical
popular; people love to see villages they know or grew up in captured in a moment in time. “We have found a wonderful postcard of a local ice cream s le r wholer had a bus converted so he could go und aroua ll the villages selling both fish and ipschi and ice cream. No-one has s enee this postcard before. There is another of a porter at Diss Station standing betweb en two horses. I think heth contrast between life back t enhe , and now, makes us all eryv nostalgic for simpler times.”
heT calendars cost £10, and oy u can buy them from Photo t Elite or Leslie Ward G fi s,ts in Diss, or direct from eD nnis. Call after 7pm on
