December : Fool’s Gold
Fool’s Gold Christmas Show had it all: Christmas songs, seasonal stories and wonderful Christmassy images. Carol sang and played the flute beautifully, while her husband Steve accompanied her on guitar and captivated everyone with his accomplished story-telling. He told us about the Norwegian Tomte – a grumpy old bearded gnome who lives in the eaves of houses and who must be given a bowl of porridge and a tipple on Christmas Eve – or else! We also heard surprising stories about the composers of some of our popular Christmas songs.
The audience was encouraged to take part using the Zoom chat and reactions features, to sing along at home and to take part in a ‘guess the year’ quiz. All through the show on the screen behind Steve and Carol appeared a marvellous array of continuously changing visuals: snowy fields and forests, snow-covered hills and cottages, lambs rescued from snowdrifts, clips from animated Christmas films and amazing pictures from the winter of 1947.
Anyone watching who had not been in the Christmas mood before would surely have been by the end of the show! Karen Mahony
November : The Great Flood of Florence, by Janet Diamond
Janet Diamond’s presentation, the Great Flood of Florence, was riveting – not only because of the hour by hour drama she described in detail, illustrated by dozens of wonderful photographs, but because of her enthusiasm and thorough knowledge of the event. Florence had always flooded, but not for centuries to the height it reached on Nov 4, 1966. After engineers opened the flood gates of two dams on the River Arno (in order to save them), ‘a catastrophic cocktail’ of water, mud, trees, cars, carrion, sewage and oil smashed into the city. This beautiful city, cradle of the Renaissance, lost so much: millions of ancient frescos, paintings, statues, books, precious archives and more. 150 people lost their lives. We heard of the heroes, some of whom risked their lives or worked themselves to exhaustion: the mayor, the ‘Mud Angels’, thousands of ordinary people who came from around the world to help (including a man from Somerset who ferried works of art to higher ground in his Land Rover). The rich and famous donated money or set up aid organisations, including Jackie Onassis, Picasso and Franco Zeffirelli. Since 1966 the banks of the Arno have been raised and the Arno River Basin Authority created. Hopefully, Florence will never experience such flooding again. Fingers crossed! Karen Mahony
October: Butterflies and Moths by Dr Ian Bedford
Dr Ian Bedford
Dr Ian Bedford, a very knowledgeable speaker, gave us a fascinating talk about butterflies and moths and how we can all help to assist in conservation of these vitally important creatures in our gardens. We were delighted to learn about the lifecycle of the ‘Painted Lady’ for example. This butterfly migrates from North Africa to the UK – taking several GENERATIONS to accomplish this feat! It then travels even further, heading up to northern Europe almost to the Arctic, before making a return trip back home to Morocco – astounding! Another astonishing creature is the Elephant Hawk Moth, whose caterpillar is one of the largest seen in the UK. It has ‘eyes’ and a spiny ‘tail’ and can be mistaken for a slug. Not to be squished, however, Dr Bedford wore his learning lightly and helped us to delight in these and other natural history facts. There are butterflies living in a symbiotic relationship with ants, for instance. The ants ‘foster’ the butterfly larvae, and even help them ‘launch’ into the great wide world, in return for a bit of a sugar snack. The more one hears about the natural world the more one appreciates that there is so much more to learn. Although there are not as many butterflies about as there were, we can all do our bit by providing flowers and as importantly, overwintering habitats. Don’t get rid of that nettle patch – there are living things that need that environment to survive! Hilary Fisk
See Ian’s website at https://gardenclubspeaker.myfreesites.net/
September: Suffragettes and Suffragists by Melanie Gibson-Barton
A Suffragette brooch
It was good to see more than 40 of our U3A members at the September coffee morning on Zoom enjoying the presentation. The term ‘Suffragette’ will always be associated with women’s fight for the vote, but Melanie’s interesting talk presented an insight into what was a century-long struggle for electoral equality. We learned the difference between ‘Suffragette’ and ‘Suffragist’, as well as how the personalities of key players shaped their campaigns and even about the influence of fashion on events. Many of us who thought we knew quite a lot about ‘Votes for Women’ had to reassess our view. There was far more to it than we were aware of: the Suffragists, although more moderate in their actions, actually made a greater contribution to the eventual success of the campaign than did the more headline-grabbing Suffragettes. Margaret Shaw
See Melanie’s website at https://www.toonstelling.com/
March – July inclusive there was a hiatus in Coffee Mornings, due to the Coronavirus Emergency.
February
Samantha Fraser with Hilary Fisk
Samantha Fraser: Riverlands Project – Porlock Vale and Streams
What the National Trust is doing to reduce the impacts of climate change and habitat loss, and to bring back nature. A presentation on the river voles on the Holnicote Estate, ‘Stage 0’ and more…
January – Open Day at the Beach Hotel
