Category Archives: Police

Sheldon Jottings for November 2012

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“He’s bootiful…”

October….harvest time. The farmers have been busy, the gardeners can relax and lay up their treasures for the winter. The cows are happy, and Bernard’s happy! Bernard is the turkey at Top Farm and very proud of himself, particularly as he was originally to be Top Farm’s Christmas lunch last year, but no-one could bear to do the necessaries. So now he struts round in all his finery, with his two turkey lady friends. They are very productive, and as such…Sheldon’s latest delicacy…turkey eggs. Now I’m very fond of poached eggs, and have been known to stretch to the occasional duck egg, but I’m still thinking that turkey poached eggs could just be a mouthful too far. Anyway Harold tells me they are delicious, and he knows about these things.

Harvest festival is always very special in a farming community. Again this year it was a beautiful service in our church, conducted by our new Curate. The church was beautifully decorated with flowers and abundant produce and the pews gleamed. The loaf of bread and the grapes on the altar echoed those in the lovely stained-glass window behind, through which the sun shone. This year it was decided to give the produce offerings directly to a local charity, instead of the usual auction in the village pub.

Congratulations to John. He is now half way through his fast track police training and came out with top marks in the halfway exams. The pressure continues as final exams loom. John will then be attached to Buxton Police Station and continue his training with a mentor.

To celebrate Bonfire Night this year and say a big thank you to Sheldon Day helpers, we are having another bonfire and firework display on the playing field at 7.00pm (Saturday November 3rd) followed by a pea and pie supper in the Village Hall. All are welcome to the fireworks and bonfire, BUT we are limiting the meal to village residents, their families and those who helped this year on Sheldon Day. If you haven’t replied and can come, please contact Andrew Joly (07768 892865) or drop a note into Lindsey at Townend Cottage as soon as possible. We look forward to seeing everyone there!

Big celebrations at the Dome in Buxton on Monday October 15th. Ken received his award from the County Council, nominated by me on behalf of the village, for the way he has helped make our village better over such a long time. Ralph Lord also received another award, nominated by Councillor Judith Twigg. Congratulations to both!

Thank you to everyone for all your good wishes after my recent short stay in hospital. I escaped, commando style as Sheila put it, as quickly as I could, and am now resting at home. I was therefore unable to attend the Parish Meeting. However, Georgina chaired it in my place, and did so excellently with Sheila’s help and support.

Vicar’s coffee morning: Tuesday November 6th

Landrover Defender Crime Prevention Day

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A Landrover crime prevention day is being held on Sunday the 23rd of September, between 10am and 2pm at Carsington Water visitor centre. Amongst other things there will be free security marking with UV fluid, subsidised diskloks and crime prevention information and advice.

Please see this document for full details, the vehicles must be registered to an address in the High Peak or Derbyshire Dales area to qualify.

Sheldon Jottings for September 2012

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Our farming families have been out hay making, dodging the bad weather in between and our Swallows are on the move, soon to leave the village until next April. I always think our Sheldon year really begins and ends with the swallows…but they were still here swooping around on August 25 for Jenna (Colin & Lindsey’s daughter) and Richard on their wedding day in our Church. We all enjoyed hearing the banns read over the past weeks, and 3.45 was the magic time on 25th August. Lindsey and Colin invited the whole village to join them in the Church and for champagne at Townend Cottage afterwards. Always a wonderful occasion. St Michael and All Angels the best place to be married and who better than the Guardian angels to watch over them for their future life together! No place better. Congratulations and all the best for a long life together, Jenna and Richard.

August was also a celebration for Julia and Mick Lester, their 25th wedding anniversary. It only seems like yesterday that I remember them on their wedding day at Sheldon Church….Hassop Hall afterwards then…and Hassop Hall now for their 25th as well! Congratulations and best wishes for the next 25.

Brilliant news about John, who, amongst many other things, is the webmaster and developer of this excellent Sheldon website. He has successfully passed all the assessment hurdles to become a police officer. He starts his training on Sept 3rd. When he told me he said: ”I think I’m still in shock to be honest!” Happy shock, but shock nonetheless. It is a most demanding process getting into the Police Force, and he deserves every possible pat on the back for being successful. Another success for Sheldon, again punching above its weight, as the Chief Executive of the National Park remarked several times when he visited the village recently and attended the start of our last Parish Meeting.

Then there was Sheldon Day. We took £4330.48 and made a clear profit of £3251.36. When you realise that we made over one thousand pounds AN HOUR, it puts it into proper perspective! It was my pleasure and honour to present the best of the best produce cup to Julia for her fantastic Victoria Sponge….this was the first time we had such a prize and the cup, a cup cake complete with cherry on top made out of wood on a beautifully made stand was all made by people from the village, and it will be presented every year. Julia also got a certificate to keep…the cup comes back to us! I also was honoured to present the Best of the Best shield in the dog show as well. The dog show was its usual noisy and most enjoyable success…39 entries this year, and as I said on the day, they all deserved to be winners! Walking from the car parking (what would we have done without Ken Brocklehurst’s kind offer of the use of his fields for the afternoon) where our busy car park attendants (thanks guys) were working out where to put the enormous number of cars down the village past the cake stall (where the cakes and goodies just fly off the shelves), past the queues waiting for their cream tea in the village hall, past all the stalls and games, the band, the dog show, and all the stalls on the playing field, it was an afternoon that will stay with me and everyone in the village for a long time. I always like to visit the Church to see the flower display and this year I dropped in several times during the day. They were magnificent, the flowers, the way they were arranged and the theme and the quiet music. The beauty of the place and the peace felt by all those who came to see our Church and its display gave an atmosphere that was truly spiritual and thoughtful and uplifting. Wonderful, always, I feel the centre of our Day, our Church. Then of course there was the Fell Race the Thursday evening before, again, a huge success, and thanks to Phil and the team for that…better than the Olympics. And then on Sunday at our Communion service Canon Tony spoke movingly of the relationship between Sheldon day and our intensely committed small local community and the community of the Church. Exactly right. The flowers were all still in the Church with the theme display, so the small congregation that morning all had to sit at the front…it took flowers and Sheldon day to get everyone to sit at the front, he said with a grin.

Meanwhile Sheldon life goes on. Andrew Lester has now finished college at Buxton, did very well in his exams and spent a happy Summer holidays working on the farm and fixing body work on cars! He’s currently thinking about options for the future, but one thing is for certain, it will involve cars in one form or another!

Ann Lomas and the whole family are back from a great week’s holiday together in Anglesey . We are all wondering if she managed to see Kate and William in their favourite supermarket; but Ann tells me she is sure she saw William fly over in his helicopter. If anyone could arrange it, Ann could! And she says she’s off back there again soon for another break. I was telling Ann about our recent short break in Llandudno…guess what, Ann has been to Llandudno every year for the last 60 years…can’t beat that. But good to see her out and about. Good health, Ann.

There was good Sheldon presence at the Olympics. Marlene and Brian are still in the clouds after a day’s trip to the Olympics for the first day of the Athletics. They reported a wonderful atmosphere and the organisation was excellent. Before that they also had a day at Wimbledon. Andrew Joly and the family went to the Fencing finals and had an excellent time. William is now keen to take it up! So won’t be long before we have a Sheldon Fencing Champion.

Vicar’s coffee morning: Tuesday Sept 4th in the village hall at 10am.

Sheldon Jottings for August 2012

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No formal Jottings this month, they resume in September…but just a couple of things to report.

The most exciting is that John, who amongst many other things is the webmaster and developer of this excellent Sheldon website, has successfully passed all the assessment hurdles to become a Police Officer. He starts his training in September. When he told me he said: ”I think I’m still in shock to be honest!” Happy shock, but shock nonetheless. He handed in his notice to the National Park Authority the day he found out where he was a very valued member of staff (what will they do without him? It is a most demanding process getting into the Police Force, and he deserves every possible pat on the back for being successful. Another success for Sheldon, again punching above its weight, as the Chief Executive of the National Park remarked several times when he visited the village recently and attended the start of our last Parish Meeting.

The other success was Sheldon Day. You will already have read about it here, with the thanks to everyone by the Sheldon Day team. But I too want to express my deepest thanks to everyone, the whole village, for making it such an extraordinary success. When you realise that we made over one thousand pounds AN HOUR, it puts it into proper perspective the achievement of the day. As I walked around during the afternoon, speaking to visitors and everyone on the stalls, what impressed me so much was the happy, contented sense of joy in the day itself; that’s what Sheldon Day is really all about! It is terrific to have the money of course, and we will decide as we always do how to distribute it at our August Parish Meeting. But much more important than mere money is the incredible community effort, and the community involvement that Sheldon Day provides, and the community spirit and togetherness that results.

Walking from the car parking (what would we have done without Ken Brocklehurst’s kind offer of the use of his fields for the afternoon) where our busy car park attendants (thanks guys) were working out where to put the enormous number of cars down the village past the queues waiting for their cream tea in the village hall, past all the stalls and games, the band, the dog show, and all the stalls on the playing field, it was an afternoon that will stay with me and everyone in the village for a long time. I always like to visit the Church to see the flower display and this year I dropped in several times during the day. It was magnificent, the flowers, the way they were arranged and the theme. Wonderful, always, I feel the centre of our Day, our Church. I have never seen such crowds, all enjoying themselves. A wonderful achievement.

Enjoy the rest of the August holiday period, more Jottings next month

Sheldon Parish Meeting Newsletter – April 2012

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A very good AGM Parish Meeting on Wednesday, with a good turnout although many had given their apologies because of holidays.

We warmly welcomed our new residents, Angie and Andy of Lower Farm, who hope to move in at the end of May. It was great to see them, especially as Andy drove back from Bradford specially to come to the meeting.

April is our election special, and I was re-elected Chair for another year, for which thanks. It is a very great honour which I never take for granted. I promised to  continue to do my best for the village and all residents during the coming year. Georgina Tanner was nominated and seconded for Vice Chair and elected unanimously. To her, many thanks and congratulations. We re-elected Brian as our Finance officer, and re-elected the existing Finance, Planning, Playing Fields (with one new member, our new resident Andy), the Sheldon Day Committee. Our new trustee for the Village Hall is Julia. Sheila agreed to continue as Parish Secretary, and Lindsey as secretary as well as Village Hall trustee. Thanks to them both for their hard work and good advice. The full list will appear in the minutes in due course.

I gave my annual report on village activates for the past year. Our activities, for such a small village, are enormous and involved almost the entire village at some time or other during the year. Attendance at our bi-monthly Parish meetings continues to be excellent with good representation from throughout the village. Looking back through the year, our small community worked together for cream teas on bank holiday Sundays and at other times, Sheldon Day, the Royal Wedding day celebrations, harvest festival, a local history weekend exhibition, rug making days, monthly local history group meetings, the Sheldon Christmas light up, the Nativity procession, Remembrance Sunday service with the laying of the wreath by Marlene on all our behalf, our twice monthly church services with an increasing attendance, monthly coffee mornings with the Vicar, the rapidly growing success of our village website, our fight for better gritting (not yet successful), our fight to retain our village as a polling station for elections (successful), and our fight for better broadband, not to mention other locally inspired and organised events; work continues on the neighbourhood plan.

This is quite a remarkable list of events held in our village throughout the year, and even more remarkable, it is never just the same two or three people helping out (complaints we often hear from other villages) but the majority of the community; in fact probably every household in one way or another is involved through out the year in some form of our community togetherness…quite remarkable.

Lindsey updated us on how plans for this year’s Sheldon Day are going…very well indeed from her report. More volunteers are needed and the team will be asking people for help as time goes on. Lindsey said that the group did discuss an informal Jubilee Weekend picnic on the playing fields (where people just bring there own food etc – no other cost or organisation required, except to have the hall ready in case of rain). Andrew says he will do a poster for it. And they would like to use some of the money from last year to buy a few jubilee coins for anyone under 21 in the village (this would probably only come to £100 or so). This was welcomed and agreed by the Parish meeting.

I explained that there is currently a vacancy for one Parish member on the National Park, and Parishes in the dales are currently being asked to vote for one of seven nominees. After hearing the election statements of all seven the meeting made its decision on which one Sheldon would vote for, and I have now sent in the completed voting paper to the electoral reform society which is running the election; the result will be known in May.

We had a discussion about the need for better broadband in the village, and this is being pursued by our broadband champion.

The police reported that crime has once again gone down in Derbyshire Dales, and of course, Sheldon, apart from the very occasional blip, is an extremely safe village, one of the safest in Derbyshire Dales. Let’s keep it that way!

I also reported on the new government consultation about how the National Park should be governed, particularly in relation to whether there should be direct elections and if so how these would be held. There is a seventeen question response required, and I read through my suggested response to all the questions. We discussed, and the response was agreed. Basically we believe, as we have done, that the whole of a national park authority to be directly elected by the local community, in some form. We believe this should also include the currently nationally appointed secretary of state members; local democracy requires local accountability and this requires locally elected members, all living within the national park they serve and accountable to the local communities they serve. Local people should have a say in National Park affairs and in who are members of the National Park. I have now sent it off to the Minister and government department in Defra.

We discussed the visit by the CEO of the National Park, Jim Dixon, to Sheldon in June. This will be on the afternoon of the June Parish meeting and he will meet as many as possible. We will put together a programme to ensure he meets everyone, and he will attend the first part of the Parish meeting that night. We will make sure he meets our businesses, the garage, pub, farming community and all who work and live here, ensuring that he meets all ages, young and old. I will report separately on this when the full programme is known.

We had a letter from Canon Tony who gave his apologies for not being able to attend the meeting regarding allocation of money raised for the Church. He said that the Church is very thankful for any financial support that it receives, and particularly for the donation from the Sheldon Day proceeds. With a very small regular church membership and the need for the church to `pay its way’, people will appreciate that donations received, unless designated, are used to help the church to remain out of deficit. However, if the Sheldon Day Organising Committee in making a donation to the church wish to indicate that their donation is for Church Repairs, the money will be designated for that alone. Rather than indicating a specific thing (unless there happened to be a special appeal at the time of the donation) Canon Tony asked  that such a donation be highlighted for the `Fabric of St Michael and All Angels Parish Church’. This way it gives discretion to the Church Council to use funds for general repairs, rather than leave money in the funds for a specific item that might not require maintenance for a while. At the moment we are faced with the need to replace the church guttering at some considerable cost. We agreed to this suggestion. We had a discussion about mowing the churchyard and ways in which the village could help with the amount required. Since this does not need to be paid until the end of the mowing season there is time. Some suggested extra cream teas and other possible fundraising events. We would also inquire why the previous arrangement (whereby we got it done free as part of a community scheme) was no longer available. We will discuss this further at our next Parish meeting

Lindsey reported that the village hall funds were in a good state but that we need to continue to think of new uses for the hall; and Oliver has very kindly volunteered to mow the village hall from now on, for which great thanks from me in particular.