FOSIL News & Views 24th June 2021 - St Ives Library and Information Centre is open for browsing, computer use, information, CAB - St Ives Town Council
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FOSIL News & Views
24th June 2021
St Ives Library and Information Centre is open for browsing, computer use, information, CAB
and (some) activities
9:30am - 4:00pm Monday – Saturday
St Ives Library &
During the G7 week we were delighted to host Cornwall Council Community Link and Police Officers and be the centre
point, providing information for all local and visitor enquires. The building was a hive of activity and over the Friday and
Saturday we also welcomed in the brilliant Writers Block Cornwall and
became a satellite Youth News Hub!
Commissioned by Cornwall Council as part of their Y7 legacy project, The
Writers’ Block created two Youth News Hubs for the duration of the G7
weekend. Based out of the Newsroom at Falmouth University and here in
St Ives, the project worked with 15 young people from right across
Cornwall to report on the G7 activities and to get local people’s thoughts
and views on them.
In St Ives, Ollie and Florence, both of whom
live locally, worked with Artistic Director
Annamaria Murphy, alongside emerging
writer Jowan Jacobs and visual artist Lizzie
Black. They interviewed a range of local
people and created postcards as visual representations of the conversations. This included
Ben, from St Ives company EBikes, who talked about the necessity of long term employment,
affordable housing and how the pandemic has increased loneliness and isolation. Ollie was
pleased to interview Councillor Kirsty Arthur, St Ives Town Mayor, and created a postcard
inspired by their conversation. and also produced an arresting postcard image from a
comment by an Extinction Rebellion protester ‘drowning in promises’
The Falmouth team, led by ex BBC South
West head Leo Devine, and a team of
writers and Falmouth Journalism students were also extremely busy.
Amongst other engagements they reported on the XR protest and the
SAS paddle Out at Gylly, had a tour around the International Media
Centre in Falmouth, got top tips from journalists from LBC, Fox News
and Al Jazeera. They were also able to follow their own stories
including sustainable clothing and Cornwall Pride, plus write op ed
pieces including Cornwall beyond ‘Poldark and pasties.’
Artistic Director Anna Maria
Murphy ‘We were so lucky to be
able to set up the St.Ives
branch, right in the centre of the
action in the library, where we were able to send bulletins and stories that our young
reporters had collected from the streets and the series of interviews arranged for
us straight to the newsroom in
Falmouth, which where then
shared with the G7 press desk.
We hope this will be the first of
many more collaborations with
St.Ives - it has been one of my favourite projects’.
The overall project has been a huge success, with young people,
parents, funders and stakeholders praising the quality of the news
output and the experience.
We echo Anna, it was wonderful to have a vibrant, creative and thought
provoking project take place again in the library, here’s to many more
as we safely navigate our way through these extraordinary times.
Emma Gibson, Cultural Services Manager
Think you're being targeted by a scam? Take your time and get
advice.
Contact @CitizensAdvice for help with what to do next by
calling 0808 223 1133, and report suspected scams to
@ActionFraudUK.
You can also visit their website bit.ly/3wdWYw8
Want to subscribe to Cornwall Council’s Scam Alert Text Service?
Subscribe on line by following this link.
https://www.cornwall.gov.uk/.../trading-standards-text.../
Citizens Advice appointments can be booked at St Ives library
Missing Jo’s Craft Classes?
Never fear – Jo is still running craft classes
although sadly not in the library (yet)
One off FREE workshops running throughout
August as follows:
• Crazy Patchwork Bookmark
C3532536 4th August
• Mini Fabric Collage
• C353253711th August
• Polymer Clay Beads
C3532538 18th August
• Ice Dyeing Fabric
• C3532539 25th August
Each workshop lasts 1.5 hours
Further info: https://www.wea.org.uk/find-
course
We are looking for volunteers to help us run this
year’s Summer Reading Challenge.
If you are between 13-18 years old, we would love
to hear from you. Volunteering at the library also
counts towards the Duke of Edinburgh Award
Interested?
Pop into the library for more information
Libraries Connected Awards 2021
Libraries Connected is an excellent website for anyone interested in all things library related. This year they are running
an award. Libraries Connected Awards 2021 – information (in brief) is as follows:
‘We have launched the inaugural Libraries Connected Awards 2021 to celebrate the
achievements of people working in libraries, acknowledging excellence and showcasing good
practice. The awards are open to all except Heads of Service.
Applications are welcomed from individuals, on their own behalf or for others, and from
partners. The judging criteria and nomination form can be found here. The deadline for
nominations is 6pm on Friday 30 July.’
Cyril Tawney (1930 - 2005) - founding father of the folk revival in the West
Cyril Tawney was a pioneer of the English folk revival with a special interest in the
Performing at the Folk Cottage,
West Country and maritime songs. He not only researched traditional folk songs of
Mitchell in 1965
the South West but also wrote songs that used local imagery and culture for many
of his compositions. He was an early inspiration for many on the 1960’s folk scene
and his songs are still sung to this day by contemporary artists.
Cyril was born into a naval family in Gosport, Hampshire in 1930, entering the
Navy at the age of 16 and serving as an electrician for some 13 years, with several
of those being spent on submarines. While still in service he appeared on an Alan
Lomax radio programme on Christmas Day 1957 singing a seasonal folk song and
the following Easter sang on TV, which led to a weekly television spot. He decided
to buy himself out of the Navy in 1959, to become a professional folk musician and
broadcaster. He was proud to be able to say that he made a living this way for
some 44 years.
He had a weekly BBC radio show called “Folkspin” and established his first folk
club in January 1962 in Plympton. The club struggled for a few months until a
move into Plymouth with a new home at the West Hoe Hotel improved audience
numbers. Known as the Plymouth Folk Song Club (PFSC), this venue was visited
by John Sleep a budding young folk-singer who was to start his own Cornish club,
the famous Folk Cottage at Mitchell, a couple of years later. The PFSC was an
inspiration for many other clubs and had several homes in the area until Cyril
opened the West of England Folk Centre in 1965. That same year saw John Sleep
open the Folk Cottage and book Cyril to play. Cyril had already performed at the Count House during its first season of
1964 and certainly returned to play Brenda Wootton’s Pipers Folk Club in 1972 at the Western Hotel in Penzance.
Cyril took the study of folk song very seriously and he decided to study English and History at Lancaster University in
1972 which he graduated from and went on to do a masters degree at Leeds Institute of Dialect and Folkloric Studies.
He later published a book ‘Grey Funnel Lines:
Traditional Song and Verse of the Royal Navy 1900 to
1970’, a classic work of naval social history and song.
Cyril did not endlessly tour as he was so busy running
the Folk Centre, researching, broadcasting and of
course song-writing. Original songs had first to come to
Cyril in the late 1950s while still in the navy and many
remain classics of the genre today. Here are a few of his
‘greatest hits’: ‘Sally Free and Easy’ (recorded by Davey
Graham, Pentangle, Bob Dylan and more), ‘Grey Funnel
Line’ (name for the Royal Navy),‘Chicken on a Raft’
(naval slang for egg on toast/fried bread), ‘Five-Foot
Flirt’ (great version by Adge Cutler) and the classic ‘The
Oggie Man’ (on Brenda Wootton’s “Pasties and Cream”
LP as ‘Oggy Man’). He produced quite a recorded
legacy of songs, but interpretations by other artists often
improve on his originals and better express their true
meaning. First EP 1962
‘The Oggie Man’ is one of Cyril’s finest compositions and he described
its origins thus: An ‘oggie’ is slang for a Cornish pasty, the full term being
‘tiddy oggie’ with its native use being confined to Cornwall and SW
Devon, especially around the naval port of Plymouth. In his navy days
Cyril remembers many places in Plymouth where you could buy oggies
but there was one particular man who sold them from a box near the
Albert Gate of the Dockyard, frequented by sailors often after returning
from a night out on the town. He had in fact heard the seller’s cry on the
radio some years before when it was requested by an overseas
Plymouth sailor on “Sounds from Home”. The subject matter had also
been suggested to him by BBC producer and friend Brian Patten one
night in a pub. All this seemed like a sign that the song had to be written,
so he started on his walk home that very evening when it began to
drizzle with rain, hence the opening line: “Well, the rain’s softly falling”.
June Tabor is one of our greatest singers and she has recorded several
of Cyril’s songs over the years. Listen to ‘Grey Funnel Line’:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61FI86oV3qA and a great rendition of
‘The Oggie Man’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgTmnGTGxeU
1970 LP includes songs collected by
Ralph Dunstan in 1930s Camborne Phil Saward
e.g. The Old Grey Duck
THOMAS BEDFORD BOLITHO, ST IVES LIBRARY AND THE LOAN EXHIBITION OF 1903 Over the past months I have been writing about the important collection of art works that we can all go and look at in the St Ives Library, without having to pay an entrance fee. Brought together over many years, I have attempted to identify where each has come from – not always satisfactorily. Although St Ives has been a major hub for artists since the late 1880s, as far as we are aware their paintings didn’t appear in the building until at least the 1960s, when I believe that several items, including the Barbara Hepworth sculpture, were transferred from the Guildhall, when the interior of the library was refurbished and modernised by Henry Gilbert. It is therefore interesting to learn that, nearly one hundred and twenty years ago, in August 1903, a week- long exhibition of art works and objects of historic interest took place in two venues: the library itself and the Drill Hall, around the corner in Chapel Street. This venture was planned to raise funds to enlarge what was then felt by the Library Committee to be its ‘sphere of usefulness’. According to a lengthy article reporting the opening in The Cornishman dated Thursday 20 August 1903, the ‘free library’, as it was then known, had financial problems. This is because it had been founded as ‘an institution without capital, without endowment and with insufficient income’. To provide a public library for the town in 1897, the cost of the land at the corner of Tregenna Place and Gabriel Street had been born by the local Member of Parliament, Mr T Bedford Bolitho; while its construction costs had been paid for by the Cornish philanthropist Mr John Passmore Edwards. Passmore Edwards’ story is well known to us, but it is likely that most people have forgotten Mr Bolitho. Thomas Bedford Bolitho, born in Penzance in 1835, was a member of the great Bolitho dynasty, which had major investments in both mining and fishing. He was a Cornish banker and industrialist and a director of the Great Western Railway. He was the Liberal Unionist Member of Parliament for St Ives between 1887 and 1900. At his death in 1915 his estate was valued at over £550,000 (£63 million in today’s money). In the absence of Passmore Edwards, Mr Bolitho officially opened the Library on 20 April 1897, and his continual involvement ensured that he would take a major role in the fundraising exhibition six years later. An organising committee was set up, chaired by Mr (later Sir) Edward Hain, the shipping magnate, and the town’s mayor on several occasions. Edward Hain had been elected Member of Parliament for St Ives following Mr Bolitho’s retirement. The vice presidents of the campaign were some of the ‘great and the good’ of the area, including Mr Bolitho himself, the Mayor, Dr Nicholls and an important St Ives artist, T Millie Dow, who lived at Talland House, once the summer home of Virginia Woolf’s family. The Cornishman article records that the exhibition consisted of almost four hundred exhibits. Works of art took pride of place; many having been loaned by people living in the community, while the artists themselves, such as W H Y Titcomb, Louis Grier and John Park, also contributed. It is interesting to realise that at the turn of the twentieth century a significant number of the local residents must have had fine private art collections. The exhibition also included a ‘curio collection’ - a hotchpot of items such as Grecian vases, autographs, coins, a swordstick that had once belonged to the Prince Regent, needlework, and string instruments. There was a historical section which consisted of the town’s civic plate, as well as precious items in the ownership of the town councils of Helston, Penzance and Truro. Ancient church silver was loaned by the vicar and churchwardens - several dating back to the seventeenth century. Preceding the opening itself, a civic procession, headed by the St Ives Artillery Band, made its way from the Town Hall (which would have been the Market Hall in 1903) to the library, and then on to the Drill Hall where there was more generous space for all the invitees. The Mayor, Alderman W Faull, in his opening remarks, said that the exhibition ‘was the outcome of a desire to make their Free Library a power for good in the town…but that the library was not doing all it was intended to do’. The report in The Cornishman does not mention items for sale, therefore any income must have been raised through the price of admission. Sadly, the article does not state what this was, and I have not managed to discover a follow-up article reporting on the event’s success. But it is very clear that a large section of the community worked extremely hard to assemble and display this complex and ambitious exhibition. Janet Axten
Ingrid Brown was due to hold a solo exhibition in the Greta Williams Gallery June 2020 – unfortunately, this could not
take place. With (some) restrictions lifted, the exhibition will now take place throughout July 2021
Below is an excerpt from the June 2020 edition of News & Views featuring Ingrid’s work.
Poetry Group Theme for June – Awakening
Awakenings Our Child Lest we forget
These are the moments when Drawing mysteries of the universe White Admirals flirt,
something suddenly clicks. Your dear hands like stars all a flutter, survey
Almost an audible sound, when the Orchestrating the night leaky gutters, this garden
mind snaps to attention. Offering a glimpse of life and death –
Something emerges from the jigsaw Of intricate energy lines busy with spring things.
of experiences She sits on a bench
and all the pieces fit together. Silent messages by hand in front of a palm tree,
All awakenings are personal. A Describing the breath-held moment through dense bush
particular ringing of a bell To consciousness a glimpse of steeple –
calling you to make the realisation, Igniting our lives an ancient window.
dream the dream, follow a path. This first spark of life A Remembrance Cross
Awakenings sharpen the senses as From the void in front of greenery
though a dormant quill pen Ralph Thorgood peers diametrically
which had waited for this moment to at the Market House,
The Dawning once ‘the’ place for gossip,
record the event
had stirred, shaken itself, dipped into The August sun pressed hard its fire a spirit-queller nearby
the ink onto the meadow as I lay to assist ghosts to rest
and there in purest calligraphy, among the towering still grass with bell, book and candle.
set down a new vision. the far off woods darkly danced Another journey’s day
Something has changed . against the blueness of the sky. in a plague year, today
You take the road less travelled. This I recall from my young substitute dying rats
Liz White awakening for sick bats, masks
- the tranquillity of distant hills various and diverse,
The Little Cares that shimmered and pressed the still quite the fashion.
timeless day Linda Collins
The little cares that fretted me,
I lost them yesterday onto my easy mind as I “War on woke”
Among the fields above the sea, dreamed in a stockade of nature’s
Among the winds at play; gift. What does it mean to be woke?
Among the lowing of the herds, It’s become just a joke
One evening as the stars began to In the sad culture wars
The rustling of the trees, ride
Among the singing of the birds, Waged by Brexit bores -
I stood transfixed and watched
The humming of the bees. the eternal sky as it spun its web of A way of dismissing
The foolish fears of what may velvet Progressive thinking
happen-- across the roof tops of my urban With a sneering putdown
I cast them all away world And a punitive frown.
Among the clover-scented grass, through brick and mortar chimney But it works with the voters
Among the new-mown hay; stacks Especially some floaters
Among the husking of the corn that stood like sentinels in Paradise. Cultural conservatives
Where drowsy poppies nod, David Moore In need of preservatives.
Where ill thoughts die and good are Consequences (i) Ivor Frankell
born,
Out in the fields with God. Snow White’s prince arrived
Elizabeth Barrett Browning Not so good news for the dwarves
(Chosen by Margaret Sidney) Back to the housework!
Consequences (ii)
Hacking through brambles
Sleeping Beauty’s Prince Charming
Kissed with thorn-pricked lips
Stephen Bales
Janet Axten Jane Dews Tricia Friskney-Adams Emma Gibson Margaret Notman Anna Martin Gill Malcolm
Phil Saward Anne Wilcox
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