He's still fairly active. He is a local historian going back to the industrial revolution having written small books on the big mill owning family and then the history of the villages that built up as a result of the mills again with focus on various hings such as the changing array of shops up to the present day. He has an old weaving cottage that he's filled with various items and information that he's acquired throughout the years including a fully working loom all at his own cost with donations taken on open days. When he dies the amount of local knowledge that will be lost will be immense.
He knows I like birdwatching so he's told me of all the places he used to go as a child getting eggs. How he regrets doing so when he's seen the decline off the birds that used to be present every year cuckoos were common as were corn crakes nightingales tree sparrows turtle doves pretty much most birds that are now in rapid decline.
He once asked the headmaster if they were doing wrong taking eggs, and the headmaster said if there was 5 taking one would be ok but if there was one or two it wouldn't be good. But like he said when he was with a few friends and they took one each it decimated the nest.
One of the eggs they all wanted was a rooks egg. There was and still is a substantial colony here, but to get them you'd need to climb into the tree tops, but one year there was one fairly low down that could be reached. They got a friend who was from a poorer family (that's just how it was, they used him to test the ice thickness in winter as well...) to go up and get it, but the local bobby was watching them and when he came down he went over and said "thas a grand lad" and patted him on the head.
Of course when climbing the tree the safest place for the egg was under his hat, lol.
07-Sep-2014 12:41:31
- Last edited on
07-Sep-2014 13:59:35
by
Wilf
