Budleigh Past and Present

I call in from time to time at Katy Gooding’s vintage and collectables shop at 57 High Street in Budleigh Salterton. There’s a blurred line between some of its contents and some of the artefacts that make up Fairlynch Museum’s collection. In my quest for traces of Budleigh’s Anglo-Indian heritage which I mention h ere   I wondered whether I might find the odd pith helmet or stuffed tiger among Katy’s collectables, or even a Belinda Lee poster.   No such luck, but Katy did show me something equally rare and interesting for an admirer of William Morris designs.    Jeannie Foord was a Glaswegian painter of plants and flowers who in 1901 published a fine book intended for use by artists, designers, students and others. The Daily Telegraph noted, "Never before has the essential character of different plants received from the point...

Fairlynch's AGM this month is a good chance for people to find out more about volunteering at Budleigh Salterton's Museum. The Annual General Meeting on Monday 14 May at 7.00 pm in the Peter Hall in Budleigh will be an occasion to hear Trustees describe recent achievements and developments at the Museum.   As well as being a forum for local residents to air their views about museum issues it will be an opportunity for Friends of Fairlynch to develop a strategy for matters such as fund-raising.       Museum Chairman Roger Sherriff said: "We've had some highly successful events and exhibitions at Fairlynch in recent years and it was good to hear that the Museum was given a mention at the Scott service in St Paul 's this year. As an Arts Centre we're keen to continue our support for local artists. "We're always in need of more stewards of course. And we're keen to hear views from Friends of Fairlynch and indeed from anyone else at the AGM ...

Above: Stuart Hibberd's memoirs, published in 1950 as This - is London... Stuart Hibberd was one of the best known voices on radio in the early days of the BBC. He joined the Corporation in 1924 and was its chief announcer until his retirement in 1951. He settled in Budleigh Salterton, living in Westfield Road.   Stuart Hibberd was born on 5 September 1893 in Broadstone, East Dorset, and educated at Weymouth College from where he won a choral scholarship to St. John’s College, Cambridge. He was always proud of his West Country roots and remained as Vice President of the Society of Dorset Men until the end of his life. On the outbreak of war in 1914 he joined the Dorset Regiment, serving with distinction in the Gallipoli campaign and also with the army in India, where he gained the rank of Captain. In 1923, he married Alice Chichester, a cousin of the future round-the-world sailor Sir Francis Chichester (1901-72). From a military family, she ...