Chairman’s Report May 2022

Once again, the Wychwoods Local History Society has had a mixed year of Zoom meetings interspersed with face-to-face meetings. We started the new programme in September, by postponing our 40th Anniversary Event because of Covid 19, followed by two very successful meetings face-to-face on Primitive Methodism and William Morris in the Cotswolds.

The New Year saw a change to the programme with John Perkins giving an interesting talk on Roman Tackley: Villas, Farms, Temples, and Cemeteries via Zoom. By February we had got back into our stride with a face-to face meeting on Oxfordshire during the Second World War, and Bertie Matthews giving a very interesting talk on the history of Matthews Mill in Shipton under Wychwood.

Journals

We have completed up-loading all our journals on to our website, and my thanks go to Sue Richards in securing a very substantial grant for the scanning of the journals.  We still have a number of printed journals available free to members who may have some missing from their collection.

During May 2021 John Bennett complied a Booklet titled ‘A Short History of Milton High Street’ for an exhibition in the library containing old photos of Milton high Street. This booklet is still available in the library.

Website.

David Betterton and Alan Vickers have been working hard on the website. Apart from the photos there are many stories of life in the Wychwoods, both written and in audio files. We would like very much to expand this section, and so if you have your own memories of the Wychwoods I am sure they would be very pleased to hear from you and help you get them onto the site. Alan has been helping many residents of the area with their enquiries regarding relatives who have lived or worked in the Wychwoods and also resurrected Ellis Groves’ (1872-1914) magic lantern glass plates. For more information on this please go to our website www.wychwoodshistory.uk

Membership.

It has been a difficult year for meetings and a few speakers would not do Zoom. However, having returned to face-to-face meetings our numbers have increased substantially. Janet Wiltshire has been able to balance the books and I’m pleased to say our finances are in very good order.

We have a very extensive and varied programme for this next season which is attached to this report. [ See here ]. I am always pleased to hear from members who might know of a speaker who would be able to talk to us on historic topics particularly of local interest. You can contact me by email here.

I would like to thank my committee for all their help and support. We are still looking for more members on the committee and for an archivist to catalogue and collate the material.

Roger Watts

Chairman and Membership Secretary

This report is also available as a PDF here