Budleigh Past and Present

  James Lackington, the wealthy London bookseller who built Budleigh Salterton's Methodist Church. Last year was the bicentenary of his death Much of the archive material in Fairlynch Museum is due to volunteer researchers like local historian Roger Lendon, who contributes regularly to the Otter Valley Association’s Ovapedia at http://www.ova.org.uk/ovapedia  On Friday 12 February Roger will be giving a talk to the East Devon branch of the Devonshire Association entitled ‘Some 19th century Budleigh worthies’. The talk will follow a short AGM, which begins at 2.30pm Manor Pavilion Theatre in Sidmouth. Roger has given in advance some details of the talk.  After a preliminary preamble on the early history of the area he will focus on a few of Budleigh Salterton’s  inhabitants in the first half of the 19th century.   He will be talking in some detail about Matthew Lee Yeates, the ship owner and bu...

    Our resident lacemaker Sue Morgan needs all her concentration — and plenty of light — to focus on her task.         But she’s more than happy to explain the finer points of her craft to visitors like Elizabeth Bloxham from Wimborne Minster in Dorset . Lace demonstrations will continue at Fairlynch on Friday afternoons in August.

A ten-year-old mezzo-soprano from Devon will be one of the stars at the third Proms in the Park series to be staged at Bicton Park Botanical Gardens http://www.bictongardens.co.uk/ near Budleigh Salterton on Friday 14 August. Hannah Jewell, described as a singing sensation whose talent is clearly beyond her years, has already recorded a CD of classical music, and is now taking weekly lessons in London with Paloma Bruce, the lyric coloratura soprano from New Zealand. Also singing in the concert will be Helen Evora, another up-and-coming Devon-based performer who has just joined English National Opera. The programme will include popular numbers like the famous ‘Flower Duet’ by Delibes from the opera Lakmé and ‘Summertime’ from Gershwin’s opera Porgy and Bess . Dr Laszlo Marosi (right), the internationally acclaimed conductor from Florida will be directing The South West Symphonic Wind Orchestra alongside Guy Woolfenden OBE, another celebrated musician who has collaborated with some of...