Bothams Up! Celebrate A Traditional MayDay In The Traditional Way

Tomorrow is Mayday. And the ideal way to spend it with is with your local Morris Dancers, The Beckworth Bothamers. As centuries-old tradition dictates we’ll be dancing on the common from midday, after we’ve been taking in large quantities of locally-brewed liquid refreshments in the early morning, and then performing a drunken pub crawl through the town from afternoon to evening.

Other attractions during the day will be The WI dancing around the Maypole between jam-making workshops, The Beckworth & Crewbury Historical Re-enactors dancing around the Maypole in Victorian dress, Daisy Chain making classes with Fern Brittan
and an inaugral horticultural show including judging of rude shaped vegetables and fruit. The crowning glory of the day, apart from the mOrris Dancing, will be the MayDay crowning of the May Person (Thanks to equal opportunities this could be a May Queen, May King or May LGBT). Please bring the whole family for a proper Spring knees-up all set to the sound of bells and accordian. Thanking You. Clifford Pinner. The Beckworth Bothamers

May Day Fish Race Tomorrow, Weather Permitting

Hello Beckworth. I hope this message finds you well, it is a reminder that this bank holiday Monday (tomorrow) your adored town council will be hosting the annual Beckworth MayDay Fish Race on the fast-flowing River Winnet. If we have a sunny day it promises to be a wonderous fun morning for most of the family. But I must advise you to please remember to keep all cats and caged, fish-eating, birds indoor. We don’t want a repeat of when Robson Green‘s winning goldfish Rose was maimed by a tabby and had to be put down (luckily just after the medals were given out).

If all competitors could please bring their race-prepared fishes (You should all have been issued with your race colours and unique numbers to paint on the sides of your aquatic entry) to the Pamela Anderson Memorial Room in the library at 9:30 for the weigh-in. The race will start at 10.45 sharp from the Ginsters Bridge, and the starter this year will be local restaurant critic, and one of TV’s favourite historical-food people, Giles Coran (who has told me his favourite historical fish is fish fingers).

Please keep an eye on weather forecasts, if it is stormy the race will take place in Beckworth High School’s swimming pool. Thanking you most warmly. Aashif Ackworth. Mayor. Beckworth Town Council

World Record Record Once Again Elludes The Town

Hello and happy Easter. Breaking not quite big enough news… This morning the local Egg Club tried again in their annual attempt to build the World’s tallest Easter egg tower on the grassy knoll between the undertakers and the public toilets. They have asked me send a big thank you to the volunteer who gave up her Easter Monday to help build the chocolate structure and to those who donated their own Easter eggs. Unfortunately they failed to break the record again, even though Beckworth’s valiant choc tower reached the giddy height of 1.1m ( about 2ft 7in), as measured by an official from Guinness, before they ran out of eggs and enthusiasm. The current world record stands at 10.79m (34ft 5in I think) so they were only a few meters (and feet) short of the target. For those interested the sp”egg“tacular record breaking tower was built last year in Cape Town, South Africa. It took over a year to build the milk and plain chocolate structure (white chocolate is considered to be candy and therefore not allowed), with a team of 143,003 builders working in shifts 24 hours a day and 1,275,505 tonnes of Easter eggs… It then lasted two minutes before completely melting. So our local Egg Club didn’t do badly given they only had a morning, a few chocolate eggs and four  chocaholic builders. They’re planning to try again next year and hope Nestle‘s or Lidl will supply the eggs. I’ll keep you posted if I hear anything. Yours Christine Batley. Chief Easter Eggs-pert. Beckworth And Slocombe Herald Incorporating Nightly Gazette

Old Beckworthian’s Easter Bike Race Today

I trust you all have had a wonderous Easter and are in truly good spirits, if so please join the anticipated throngs of spectators at Beckworth School’s 17th century velodrome this afternoon… For today it is the annual cycle race meeting of the institution’s alumni. The usual highlight of the afternoon, The Class of 1942′s “Penny Father’s competition”, has been cancelled as there are no living survivors of the class, but in it’s place we have a new nail-biting contest. The Class of 1952′s “Penny Father’s competition”. We are expecting about a dozen old boys and masters to ride their vintage high-wheeler Penny Farthing bikes, all aiming to win the inaugral Rt Hon Alvin “Toffee Smuggler” Lewes Cup. Don’t forget this school holiday there are track days at the velodrome for all of the school’s alumni, so come on down. Yours Sir T.T. “Wonky” Windsor. President. Beckworth School Old Boys

Easter Services This Easter

Good evening my flock. Easter, my second favourite Christian time of the year after Christmas (I love that best because of all the presents, food, drink and parties), is almost upon on us and as usual your local parish church will be having almost continual services in celebration, and our annual multi-faith Easter Egg hunt (on Friday if we get enough eggs donated). And i’m sorry to say I will be missing all the fun as I’m off an almost-all expenses paid trip, with the the Bishop, to Disneyland France for a whole week and we jet off tomorrow… I only found out this morning that I had come second in this years C of E’s Got Talent competition (The Bishop came first!) of which this trip was the prize. So church warden Noddy Holder has stepped up to the alter, so to speak, and will be taking all the services in my absence… I’ve roughly outlined what he should do in each service, so you’ll be in safe hands. I mean, what could go wrong? So please join him at Christ’s home this Easter, i’ll be thinking of you. God Bless You all. Cyril Knutsford, Vicar, Beckworth St Faiths

Celebrate The Palm At Our Service Of Thanks Today

Good morning my flock. Today is a most important date in the church calendar and one which I look forward to the whole year. I am of course talking of Palm Sunday, when God’s family, close friends and aquaintances celebrate the time our Lord casually rode into town astride a dying donkey, and just before cooking his twelve disciples a light lunch invented the ultra-versatile palm oil. The Bible tells us he’d decided on a light finger buffet as he had plans to host a large more supper supper that evening…And being a very caring chap he didn’t want to spoil the appetites of his chums. Inventing the palm oil whilst making the brunch oil was soon recognised to be a miracle, for it changed how Christian’s cooked fried food forever and became an active ingredient in everything from condoms to hair gel. So the Church has for centuries given praise for the palm on the last Sunday before Easter. And just like our Lord and his chums we eat biblical fried foods off the floor together, such as bacon, black-pudding and eggs, cooked in the wonderful life-enhancing oil. Church warden Noddy Holder will be on cooking duty with his trusty frying pan so please bring your foods early to be cooked (and bring plenty of ketchup as we always run out). The service will start at 12.12pm to give me time to rid myself of a hang-over (I celebrated the last in the series of Ant & Dec’s Saturday TakeAway a little too enthusiastically last night) and must finish by 2.15pm, as I have to rush off to London to see 42nd Street at the theatre. So so please join me at Christ’s home and let us fill the pews with praise and food smells. God Bless You all. Cyril Knutsford, Vicar, Beckworth St Faiths

Annual Fair In Town

Bonjour Beckworth. I hope this message finds you well, it is a reminder that this Sunday, the annual french Le Marche De Fromage Et Onion (Cheese And Onion Market) will be setting out it’s stalls in town. This time of year is a golden opportunity to buy your favourite french cheeses, breads and onions directly from our garlic and snail’s legs loving cousins from across le ponde.

This year we are reinstating the sale of wine and hope this won’t result in the many drunken street brawls we have suffered in past years. Nor will we tolerate urinating and vomiting in the street, nor in people’s front gardens or through letter boxes.

We are praying that the famous Emmental Fromagiers (“Cheese Soldiers”) will be released from quarantine in time to participate in the famous Cheese parade and they hope to be led by local onion fan Robbie Williams and his gang of girl guides and scouts.

If the weather stays dry there will be all day events for the whole family, including morris dancing by The Beckworth Bothamers, donkey rides, a coconut shy, a daredevil kite display by local celebrity Noel Edmunds and of course in the afternoon the crowning of Beckworth’s Miss Garlic 2017.

Also the Beckworth & Crewbury Historical Re-enactors will be staging a recreation (using play dough) of the 12th century invention of pickled onions by the famed Lady Of Chalot.

Thanking you most warmly. Au Revoir, Aashif Ackworth. New Mayor. Beckworth Town Council