Village news from Helen Price – 3rd Jan 19

Published 31 December 2018

Kings Bromley Whist Drives

Tuesday afternoon whist drives in the Village Hall will restart after Christmas on 8th January at the usual time, 1.30 for a prompt 2.00 pm start. They will continue weekly due to popular demand. If you have not been before how about giving it a try, we play friendly whist with a break for tea and coffee.
Entrance is £1.50 to cover the cost of hiring the Village Hall.

HS2 Community and Environment Fund Award

The Kings Bromley Parish Council and Village Hall Committee are delighted to announce that we have been awarded a contribution of £50,000 towards the Kings Bromley Village Hall Refurbishment project from the Phase One HS2 Community and Environment Fund.

The Fund supports local communities that are demonstrably disrupted by the construction of Phase One of the brand new high-speed railway which is being built between London and the West Midlands.

This means that, with the generous donations already received from village organisations and residents, we are now able to go ahead with the tendering process.

Following earlier consultation with members of the local community, the plans have been amended to incorporate suggested improvements. The project will include a major upgrade of the kitchen and toilet facilities together with improvements to the lobby area.

We hope you will all be as pleased as we are that we can finally give the Village Hall the ‘facelift’ badly needed and we shall continue with our fund-raising activities through the sale of bricks and approaches to other funding sources, so that we can hopefully also make some improvements to the main hall area.

Village news from Helen Price – 20th December

Published 17 December 2018

Kings Bromley Harmony Choir

The village choir gave a splendid concert in church on Saturday 8th December consisting of carols and a variety of songs, both Christmassy and non-seasonal. It was almost a year to the day since the choir gave their first public performance, also in church, and the number of choir members has grown substantially since then.

Despite very wet weather, there was a very good attendance to enjoy the afternoon. Kathryn, choir leader, had also brought two of her pupils along and they gave excellent solo performances. Tea and mince pies were served during the interval.

Thanks to Kathryn and the choir for an excellent concert and also to everyone who came to support them.

Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal

Kings Bromley’s local appeal, including collection boxes from businesses in the district and donations from village organisations, is so far £3,573.54, an amazing achievement, believed to be a record for the village. The house-to-house collections raised £776.09 of the above total so thanks to all the collectors.

Kings Bromley Historians

Our first taste of ‘Christmas Past and Present’ was a view of Stonehenge. Mary Bodfish, our speaker, explained that not only was it a sacred site for the summer but also the winter solstice. The sun was fading in the sky and to ensure its return, evergreens and berries were used to represent returning life.

The Roman sun god was Saturn, hence their winter festival Saturnalia. For the Persians it was Mithras who was celebrated on December 25th, the shortest day according to the Julian calendar. When finally Christianity reached Rome, the Emperor Constantine decreed that Christians could worship openly and that the date of Christ’s birth be fixed as December 25th. In the orthodox church it is 6th January.

The tradition of the Christmas tree began with Queen Charlotte. It was also mentioned in the diary of the 13 year old future Queen Victoria “after dinner two trees hung with lights and ornaments”. Martin Luther decorated a fir tree with candles, a tradition carried on until 1903, when EverReady produced a string of electric tree lights. Much safer!

Father Christmas began life as Captain Christmas in a play by Ben Johnson. Also he appeared in early mummers plays together with the characters Mince Pie, Carol and Wassail. December 6th is the feast day of St Nicholas , whose name became Santa Claus.

Mary was a great theatrical orator and we all enjoyed her presentation.

The following day was Christmas lunch at the Royal Oak, where we all enjoyed an excellent meal. Allan Howard spoke of the highlights of last year and Lynne outlined considerable progress made in the Archive.

Following our Christmas walk on 30th December, our next meeting will be in the Village Hall on January 25th at 8.00 pm when Allan will talk about Major General Sir Ronald Bertram Lane. All are welcome.

Bin Stickers

Published 15 December 2018

Stickers to remind local households that black bin liners should not be used in blue bins.
Through the Lichfield and Tamworth Joint Waste Service, Lichfield District Council and Tamworth Borough Council are busy putting stickers on all blue bins across Lichfield, Burntwood, Tamworth and the surrounding areas.
The stickers warn local households that black bin bags should not be used in blue bins, and that bins will not be emptied if they are.
This comes after five truck-loads of recycling were recently turned away from the recycling sorting plant due to recycling being contaminated with black bin liners.
If a load of recycling is rejected, unfortunately it ends up being sent to landfill, which costs more, wastes other people’s recycling efforts, and is bad for the environment.
Councillor David Leytham, Lichfield District Council’s Cabinet Member for Operational Services, Leisure & Waste, said: “To reduce the chance of recycling being rejected by our sorting plant, we need to make sure our residents know what can and can’t go in blue bins.
“This is why we’re putting stickers on blue bin lids, so everyone is aware that we won’t empty the bin if it contains recycling in black bin bags.
“Our preference is for recycling to be loose in your blue bin. However, if you want to bag it, please use a clear bag or simply empty the bag of recycling into your blue bin and then reuse the plastic bag.”
For more advice about how to recycle and what to recycle, go to www.lichfielddc.gov.uk/wasteless where you can download the Waste Less guide.

Village Hall Refurbishment latest

Published 7 December 2018

The Kings Bromley Parish Council and Village Hall Committee are delighted to announce that we have been awarded a contribution of £50,000 towards the Kings Bromley Village Hall Refurbishment project, from the Phase One HS2 Community and Environment Fund.
The Fund supports local communities and that are demonstrably disrupted by the construction of Phase One of the brand new high speed railway which is being built between London and the West Midlands.
This means that, with the generous donations already received from village organisations and residents, we are now able to go ahead with the tendering process.
Following earlier consultation with members of the local community, the plans have been amended to incorporate suggested improvements.
The project will include a major upgrade of the kitchen and toilet facilities together with improvements to the lobby area.
We hope that you will all be as pleased as we are that we can finally give the Village Hall the “face lift” it badly needs and we shall continue with our fund-raising activities through the sale of bricks and approaches to other funding sources, so that we can hopefully also make some improvements to the main hall area.
We hope that we will be able to create a really fine Village Hall of which we can all be proud and which will attract more members of the community and surrounding area to use its facilities in the future.