Chairman’s Newsletter
Our events calendar for 2009 is almost filled. Now, nearly half-way through the year, we have had a varied selection of talks and demonstrations at our meetings. Kevin Wilkes, foreman at Turner’s violins in Digbeth, gave us an insight into the construction and repair of a variety of stringed musical instruments. In May, Tony Critchley, an amateur woodcarver from Lichfield brought a selection of his work and gave us all an enjoyable and rewarding evening into the intricacies of his craft. We look forward to a couple of two-hour sessions of wood-turning with one of our members, Graham Lovett, for our meeting in August, and will welcome visitors to come along too to enjoy the sessions with us. For our meeting in October, we will have another guest speaker, Brian Maiden, a furniture maker of high renown from Evesham will be talking about some of his latest work.
In July our annual outing will take members and their wives to Bodenham Arboretum for an afternoon guided tour of the grounds. The day will start with a visit to the Worcestershire County Museum at Hartlebury Castle in the morning to see the progress made on a scaled-down version of a gypsy caravan that Ced Lewis, one of our members, is building. After coffee, our party will travel the short distance to Bodenham for lunch.
Interspersed between these monthly meetings, we have our usual members’ evenings when items are brought to show and discus during the course of the evening. Last April our “Hands-On” evening dealt with tool sharpening where many of our members were able to pick up tips as well as sharpen a few of their own tools. Our June and November members’ meetings will ‘compete’ for the Ralph Fellows trophy. For the June meeting, members have been given a couple of pieces of pine and have been asked to produce a child’s toy which they will bring along to show.
Colin Spencer