Minutes of the Takeley Local History Society AGM
28th November 2006
Those present:
Trevor Allen, Steve Hazon, June Evans, Phyllis Altham, Bill Marshall, Marilyn Sayers, John Monk
In all 39 members attended the meeting with 6 visitors and 5 members of Jack Wrights family.
1. Previous Minutes
The minutes of the 29th November 2005 meeting were circulated and agree to be accurate. Proposed by Bill Marshall, seconded by Jack Wright.
2. Election of committee
Committee comprises:
Trevor Allen President
Steve Hazon Chairman
June Evans Secretary
Phyllis Altham Treasurer
Pat Salmon
Bill Marshall
Marilyn Sayers
Dave Venable
John Monk
Roy Whiteman
The existing members of the Committee were all willing to re-stand and this was proposed by Margaret Underwood, seconded by Mike Boggis and unanimously accepted.
3. Awards
The following address was read by Steve Hazon:
“I would like to single out one of our members because he isn’t here at the moment; Pat Salmon is recovering at home from his recent operation.
Pat is a founder member of TLHS and up until now had been to every meeting both general and committee meetings since TLHS started in 1998, the only person to have done this.
Much of Pat’s work is behind the scenes researching in the Chelmsford Record Office or Herts and Essex Observer archives finding information or talking to older residents of Takeley and it is this information which brings our various booklets to life.
Pat’s MHG book which took him over 4 year to complete is our best seller and has sold over 250 copies which have sold far and wide including Australia, Canada and America. His latest book is of a slightly different form describing a range of characters and events using information compiled from the local newspapers of the time.
Altogether Pat has been author or co-author of 7 of our 18 books.
Pat also freely contributes his findings to the authors of all our other books and without him many of them would be much thinner and may never have been written at all.
Looking back Pat has been the ideas man for many of the other things we have done in the society. The calendars we produced in 2002 and 2003 were largely Pat’s idea as were the postcards we have just had printed. It was Pat’s idea to transcribe the headstones in the churchyard when many of us thought the task too big to take on.
Without Pat’s contribution the Society would not be in the position it is today, so I wish Pat a speedy recovery.”
The meeting responded in wishing Pat a speedy recovery.
Steve continued:
“It is very hard to talk about Pat without also thinking about Bill Marshall as the pair of them have collaborated on so many books.
Bill has been responsible for 9 of our 18 books and if he hadn’t started the first book on the War Memorial I’m not sure if we would have ever produced any books at all.
Bill is also responsible for having the books printed and he binds them at home with his son John. He also sells them from home and keeps track of everything sold and this has played a large part in keeping our bank balance healthy and our subscriptions down so we all owe a debt to Bill for that. We have now sold over 1360 books in all.
Therefore as a small recognition of the service which both Pat and Bill have done for the Society we are making them both Life Members of Takeley Local History Society.”
Certificates were presented to Bill Marshall and Pat Salmon’s sister to pass to Pat.
4. Activities of TLHS for 2006
Books
The following booklets have been published in the last year bringing the total number of publications to 18
Takeley Churchyard Guide Steve Hazon
Mole Hill Green Cricket Club Pat Salmon
Takeley’s Service People of WWII (Vol2) Bill Marshall/ Pat Salmon
The Royal British Legion, Takeley Branch Bill Marshall
Characters and Events (Vol 1) Pat Salmon
Takeley – The Street N.Watkiss /J.Monk/A.Yates/S.Deeley
At 206 pages this is our biggest book and the result of over 2.5 years work.
Total books sold; over 1360.
We also now have two postcards available.
Others books planned and on the way:
Brewers End, National Service, Takeley at war, Bambers Green, Pantomimes, Waltham Hall, Bassingbourne Hall, Smiths Green.
Other Completed projects
Chapel Memorial Inscriptions.
Website and Email
Contacts from the website , 49 respondents, over 500 emails in all. Many of these have been helped with genealogy by Pat Salmon.
Ongoing Projects
Quarter Session Rolls - Nia and John Watkiss
Wills, several now on website - Nia and John Watkiss
A120 pics. – Being scanned.
Newspaper articles – Phyllis collecting articles from the newspapers.
Old Newspapers - Pat Salmon looking at old papers.
Scanning of all old documents and photos
Arial photos – still have a quarter of the village to do Roy Livermore
Buildings database - Roy Livermore is working to produce a computer
database of interesting properties and places within the parish.
Presentations in 2006
7 February, Speaker: Trevor Allen, Takeley Records
9 May, Speaker Tim Turner of Sworders, The History of Auctions and Auctioneering
21 July, A field visit to Bush End Church and The Shell House Hatfield Forest, led by John Monk
3 October, Speaker: Jacqueline Cooper, CLAVERING CASTLE, A MYSTERIOUS MOATED MONUMENT
28 November, AGM and THE BRITISH TELEPHONE SERVICE 1937-1980. Speaker Jack Wright.
5. Dates for next year
2007 dates
6 February Speaker to be announced
8 May Speaker to be announced
18 September Speaker to be announced
27 November Speaker to be announced and AGM
6. Financial Report
A draft set of accounts was presented by Phyllis Altham. This will be audited by Graham Thompson the week before Christmas. It was proposed b y John Monk, seconded by Jack Wright was unanimously accepted by all at the meeting that if the draft minutes were audited with no changes that they be accepted..
7. AOB
Ernie Field brought news of the next Gt, Hallingbury meeting 29th Nov06 Speaker Stuart Bale topic, “Follow the Flow, Journey of the River to the Sea”.
Trevor Allen gave an update on the digging that is going on in fields between the airport and Takeley village. These are archaeological digs and finds from many periods have been found.
John Monk thanked Steve Hazon for the work h had done in preparing The Street book and other TLHS activities in general.
8. Presentation
Steve Hazon introduced the evening’s speaker, Jack Wright. who was to speak on “The British Telephone service 1937-1980”. Jack is well known to all having presented on two previous occasions. The committee was so pleased to hear Jacks talk last year and impressed by his dedication in driving from Chelmsford for every meeting that we marked this with Life Membership. Therefore, slightly belatedly, Steve presented Jack a certificate to mark the event.
The talk was extremely well received and the meeting concluded with drinks and food provided by June Evans.
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