From Our Files: Rough roads... GP booking row... skate petition... slurry pit drama
75 YEARS AGO
AT the New Forest Rural District Council meeting on Monday the Works and Estates Committee reported that the New Forest Association of Building Trades Employers had written expressing concern with the position which, it stated, was rapidly arising in the district owing to restrictions on building works which, it was feared, would cause serious unemployment.
It asked the Council to take what steps it could to ensure continuity of work and suggested that the monthly quota of work allocated to the Council could be raised considerably.
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THE serious condition regarding the County’s roads was set forth in a report of the Roads Committee to the County Council in November, which stated: “When the 12-year programme for tar-macadam surfaces was inaugurated in 1933, it was expected that the programme would be completed by 1945 and resurfacing then begin all over again. This, of course, has not been possible, and indeed there is little likelihood of any large-scale resurfacing being put in hand for some time.”
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HIS many friends learnt with deep regret of the death, which occurred on Saturday, of Mr James Alexander MacDonald Johnstone, of Old Milton Road, New Milton, after an illness lasting just over two weeks.
“Mac,” as he was popularly and widely known to all, was a member of the New Milton branch of the British Legion, and secretary of the New Milton St John Ambulance Brigade, for which he did an enormous amount of voluntary work.
During the first world war “Mac” won the M.M. and bar, but even few of his friends know of the circumstances under which he was awarded these decorations.
50 YEARS AGO
HOLIDAYMAKERS who had paid to go into the Highcliffe clifftop car park and then saw the state of the cliffs and beach, felt they had been “conned”, it was stated at Tuesday’s meeting of Christchurch Council, when an unsuccessful attempt was made to get members to agree to allow up to six hours of free parking in the car park so long as cliff stabilisation work is going on. The amendment was lost by 12 votes to 11.
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WHEN Christchurch Council’s Housing Committee was given valuations on five Council houses, which the tenants wished to purchase, they deferred consideration of the matter because they thought that the District Valuer had undervalued them and sought a valuation from a valuer in private practice on one of the properties – 25 The Hawthorns, Somerford.
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BURLEY patients have to book appointments to see their doctor through the doctors’ group surgery at Bransgore.
And Group-Capt. R. Ford told Burley Parish council that this new system was causing an “unnecessary inconvenience to the elderly and less mobile”.
Group-Capt. Ford said he had received a number of complaints from villagers who had difficulty in booking appointments. “Some old people have difficulty with telephone dialling and have to trouble neighbours or friends to do it for them.”
25 YEARS AGO
MORE than 320 teenagers in Brockenhurst have signed a petition saying they would like to see a £5,000 mini-ramp for skateboarders installed in the village. Twenty-seven youngsters, aged between 11 and 17, turned out for the monthly parish council meeting to ask local councillors if they would support them in their venture to the tune of £1,000. Some of the youngsters, who have offered to donate their pocket money towards the ramp, claim there is nowhere safe for them to play in the village.
“There is nothing for young people to do in Brockenhurst,” said 14-year-old Peter Bramwell, who lives in Partridge Road and goes to Highcliffe Comprehensive. “We need somewhere people can go. The older people in the village are generally against us skateboarding. They think we get in the way.”
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THIS will be a Christmas like no other for the Veal family of Pennington. On Thursday evening in last week their three-year-old daughter Abigail fell into a deep cesspit at their grandmother’s home at Walhampton, and swallowed mouthfuls of the contents whilst splashing around.
Lymington firemen took a mere six minutes to reach the scene, closely followed by an ambulance crew, but by that time Abbi lay submerged and unconscious in the cesspit.
Copybook action ultimately led to admission to the Southampton intensive care unit – where the toddler showed such resilience that she was able to be released on Saturday evening.
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LOCAL author Michael Stannard presented a copy of his new book, John Draper’s Treasure, to Christchurch Council last week.
It tells the story of how the priory church was returned to the town by Henry VIII at a time when so many others were being destroyed, thus helping to make Christchurch what it is today.
