Club News

Zak Brotherton, Ace Angler

This is Zak Botherton and proud Dad, Glen, pictured at an international angling competition in Portugal.  Zak, a 14-year-old student at The De Montfort School, is a member of Evesham & District Angling Association and a bit of a whizz with rod and line.  He wanted to go to the competition with members of the Association, but the cost of travel and accommodation was a bit out of reach.  Evesham Rotary Club heard about Zak's problem and was happy to help.  Over two blisteringly hot days, Zak competed as a team member and also a solo angler.  His team came 6th, and Zak himself 4th and 5th on the two days.  The EDAA under-20's excelled and won gold.  Zak competes regularly with adults and has recently notched up a mixed pairs - adult and child - win.  Have a look at Zak's Facebook page where he writes up all his competition experiences.  Well done, Zak.  We're proud of you too.     

Crocus Planting, 2 November 2022

Another year, another crocus planting event! The purple crocus represents the purple dye used to mark the fingers of people around the world immunised against polio.  This time, a team of Rotarians was helped by many enthusiastic students  from the Interact club at PHHS to plant 2000 crocus bulbs (well, to be honest, they did all the work). This time, the venue was Evesham Abbey. The Abbey Trust has a project to build a pathway along what was the Abbey nave, and this will now be lined by the crocuses we planted today (we even managed to plant some daffodils). Look out for a beautiful display in Spring!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Murder Mystery Evening

Who killed John Lemon? That was the question we had to answer after watching the Phoenix Theatre Group perform the world premiere of "Shockin' Rockin'", a sixties-themed murder mystery specially written for us by Ian Leaver.

Many theories were discussed while we tucked into an excellent buffet; we then had a chance to quiz the characters. Their answers were always truthful but not necessarily helpful! Finally, the grand revelation showed that several teams had deduced who the villain was, but the prize went to Hein's team, who gave the best explanation of their reasoning.

The evening concluded with a sixties disco. We raised money to support Phoenix, who lost all their costumes in a fire last year, and also for Ian's chosen charity for sick children. 

 

Remembrance Day, November 14th, 2021

Once again, there was no church service this year. However, the traditional parade was held, from Market Square to the War Memorial. President Pamela and Rotarian John Mansfield marched in the formal procession, and laid wreaths. It was a moving occasion, with a large parade and many spectators from Evesham and beyond.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Purple for Polio - Crocus Planting, 19 October 2021

Following the success of the crocus planting at Crombe Court, we decided to move nearer home. A team of Rotarians, ably assisted by students from the Interact Club at Prince Henry's High School, planted 2000 corms on the riverbank opposite Raphael's Restaurant.

The corms were planted in the shape of a P4P logo, and the turf was replaced, to deter the unwelcome attentions of squirrels and other creatures.  

Thanks to Raphael's for providing free transport across the river, and an excellent lunch.

 

 

Freedom Centre Audio-Visual System, 29 September 2021

We have donated some of the money raised by the Tree of Light 2020 to enable the Freedom Centre to buy a high-resolution audio-visual projector for their impressive new premises in South Littleton. Several Rotary members enjoyed a tour of the new facility, followed by a formal hand-over of the projector by President Pamela to Tracy Hemming.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Tree of Light Switch-On, November 26th, 2020

The Tree of Light switch on is usually a very festive occasion, with many people present holding candles and enjoying music from school choirs and perhaps some (non-alcoholic) mulled wine.

Once again, though, Covid-19 has caused us to change our plans. The Tree was indeed switched on at 6:30,  and looks as impressive as ever.  There was a ceremony, but once more we have resorted to electronic media; you could watch it on Facebook or on out website - and still can! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Remembrance Day 2020 

 

Remembrance Day 2020 did not allow the usual acts of commemoration because of lockdown, but a 'virtual' remembrance meeting by Zoom and a simple wreath laying ceremony at the Evesham War Memorial took place. Evesham Rotary Club President Trevor Battersby and former soldier John Mansfield laid the wreath to mark the club's respect for those who fell and also in gratitude to those who now serve, whether in the Armed Forces or in any way as responders during the Covid-19 crisis. 

 

 

 

Photo courtesy of Peter Young

WORLD POLIO DAY

When you see the illuminations of the Bell Tower in the old part of Evesham this Saturday, you might well wonder why they have turned purple!

The answer is partly that Saturday 24th October marks World Polio Day commemorating the birth of Jonas Salk, who led the first team to develop a vaccine against polio. The global campaign for the eradication of polio is organized by the World Health Organisation and supported largely by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation with the help of Rotary International.

When the campaign started in 1988, the terrible disease of polio was endemic in 125 countries, but thanks to a tremendous amount of work and investment, this has been reduced down to only 2 – Pakistan and Afghanistan. And just this year the whole continent of Africa was declared free of wild polio. A great achievement!

So why purple? The campaign in the UK is known as ‘Purple4Polio’, so called because purple is the colour of the dye used on childrens fingers to show they have been vaccinated.  Evesham Rotary has been part of this campaign for many years in various ways. Over the past few years they have developed a partnership with the Trustees of the Walled Garden at National Trust, Croome and over 14,000 crocus corms have been planted with help from students of Prince Henry’s High School and The De Montfort School. The crocus line the pathways in the Garden and bloom beneath the heritage collections of apple and pear trees.

It is hoped to hold a “Spring Flower Festival’ in the Walled Garden next year so everyone can enjoy the beautiful sight of all the spring bulbs. In the meanwhile, look out for the purple illuminations in Evesham Old Town!

 

 

 

Fundraising success!

The Rotary Club of Evesham would like to thank everyone who helped in any way with our recent Art Auction in support of Freedom Day Centre.  The funds raised will help to make life better for the service users at the Centre from Evesham and Vale.

The consequences of Covid-19 have made this a very challenging time for all of us, but especially for the small local charities who do such good work in our Community but who have lost access to many of their usual sources of fundraising.

The Rotary Club of Evesham has been working very hard behind the scenes to see what we can do to facilitate access to funding from a number of sources to minimise this problem. We are extremely happy to share that working with several local charities we have together raised significant funds. With the Art Auction and these grants the Rotary Club of Evesham has helped local charities raise around £15,000. Typical of the responses we have received are ‘the grant for the youth club has taken a huge weight off my shoulders’ and ‘thank you to Rotary for keeping us informed of all funding and being there for people like me who need the help filling the forms sometimes’.  

We don’t intend to rest on our laurels! We want to continue doing all we can to help those who are less fortunate in our community and we are sure we can rely on your support in helping to achieve this.

Rotary – ‘People of Action Making a Difference’ in our community!

 

 

Congratulations to all concerned!

 

 

Change of plan for the Art Auction: Circular for Contacts

Please use this as appropriate to explain to your contacts the change in arrangements for the Art auction:

Announcement

(Dear Friend)

We hope you are enjoying following our Facebook pages to see the art being offered as part of the Art Auction in support of the Freedom Day Centre in Badsey. Please keep looking for regular previews of the prints as this will give you an idea of the broad range of subjects that are available.

We are very sorry to have to announce that, because of Covid-19 restrictions placed on the Freedom Day Centre by Social Services, we are unable to use the Centre for the purpose of viewing the prints during the week running up to the Auction closing on Saturday 8th August.

Thanks to the kindness of two businesses in Evesham, however, we are displaying a selection in the windows of Reeds Rains Estate Agents and Brew Bear Coffee House, both on Evesham High Street. So, if you have business in Evesham, take a moment to look at the prints being displayed!

Bidding is now open through the website, so please submit your bids using the online bidding form which you can find at

www.freedomauction.online

We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause but we trust you will understand that this is part of the ‘new normal’ we will have to get used to. We also hope that it will not prevent you from putting in a bid and helping us to raise money for this very worthy cause!

Thank you so much for your support.

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Happy 90th Birthday, John!

Rotarian John Mansfield recently celebrated his 90th birthday. We would normally have had a riotous celebration, but at the moment only a few of us, carefully socially distanced, were able to assemble on the lawn outside his dwelling to toast him. As you see from the photo, this was very well received!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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It’s nice to know our elected representatives acknowledge and appreciate the good work we have all been involved with at this time of crisis!

Nigel Huddleston MP

Member of Parliament for Mid Worcestershire

HOUSE OF COMMONS LONDON SW1A 0AA

Dear Rotary Club of Evesham

It has been brought to my attention the absolutely wonderful work that you have been undertaking on behalf of the local community in this time of the coronavirus crisis, including making laundry bags, headbands, face mask extenders and helpful items for people with dementia. I know that you have made and delivered an extraordinary number of items, all designed to make people more comfortable and feel safer, and your team of volunteers have worked so very hard in such a short space of time.

Could you please pass on my sincere congratulations and appreciation to all of those involved. It is acts like these which make our community what it is – and volunteers with the Rotary Club of Evesham are amongst the very best of what makes a wonderful community and society. I know you will continue to keep up the good work in good times and in bad, and I offer you all my deepest thanks.

Once this awful crisis is over, if you would care to invite me to come and visit you at the Rotary Club, I would very much enjoy the opportunity to meet some of the volunteers and have the chance to thank them in person.

With very kind regards,

2nd June 2020

Tel: 020 7219 5814
nigel.huddleston.mp@parliament.uk

Great community achievement

Letter of thanks to volunteers who took part

PPE and other items produced for Evesham Care Home workers
and Domestic Care workers

Dear All

We are astounded by your achievements! In less than four weeks, since we first came together as a community team to produce PPE items for Evesham’s Care workers, you have produced some 831 items, 794 of which have been delivered to the Care Workers we wanted to acknowledge. In doing this, you achieved the target of providing each one of them with whatever they had requested – laundry bags/headbands/extenders – and even added a few ‘Fiddler Muffs’ for people living with dementia. Well done indeed!

Here below is a table showing a breakdown of what was achieved during May;

Laundry bags              270

Headbands                  406

Mask extenders           110

Fiddler Muffs                 14

Reserve - 9 laundry bags and 28 headbands

Grand total of items delivered = 800

Grand total of items produced = 837

We have received many emails expressing grateful thanks from the recipients together with a few photos. We are in the process of posting them on the website and Facebook page of the Rotary Club of Evesham for everyone to see. We think you also all know that the Evesham Journal included an article in last week’s edition. Please let me know if you would like your own copies of any of these and we will email them to you.

From Rotary’s point of view, we think we can draw this project to a close now. We want to thank everyone once more for all your efforts and would ask that you pass on the spirit of this letter to any friends in your circle who have contributed to this result. Please do not hesitate to contact us in future if you think our Rotary Clubs can help in any way with community or charity issues in our area.

Best wishes

Trevor

Trevor Battersby

President Elect; 2020-2021

Rotary Club of Evesham

rotary.trevby@gmail.com

Great community spirit

More good news and an example of how people are pulling together to help our NHS and Care Worker ‘Heroes’ during this Covid-19 emergency!

Volunteers from several outlying villages, including Fladbury, Cropthorne, Lenchwick, Dumbleton, Charlton and Lower Moor as well as from Evesham Town itself, Evesham Rotary and Rotary in the Vale came together over the past few weeks to produce a range of items of PPE for donation to our local health services. Following on from donations to hospitals in Worcester, Redditch and Droitwich attention turned to recognising our own local Care Home Workers.

Nearly 400 Care Workers in 8 homes in and around the town were identified. To start off with they all received small gifts in recognition of their hard work of chocolates and hand lotion donated by the Rotary Club of Evesham.

‘Who doesn’t need chocolates and hand lotion at the moment? Bring on expanding waistlines and softer hands!”, said the staff at Briarlee Care Home!

Following on from this, a team of volunteer sew-ers from the villages produced hundreds of laundry bags, headbands, face mask extenders and ‘fiddler muffs’ that were delivered to each of the Care Homes. 

Over 500 items were delivered! - laundry bags, headbands, face-mask extenders and fiddler muffs

Evesham Rotary President Elect, Trevor Battersby said, “We have been delighted to co-ordinate this effort, which has achieved a magnificent result in a very short space of time. Our Club was also pleased to provide financial support to De Montfort surgery to help them prepare for the emergency and continue to offer whatever help we can to the Foodbank operated by Caring Hands in the Vale. These initiatives are exactly what Rotary Clubs across the country are about and we are proud to support our local communities here in Evesham and The Vale.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pershore Inner Wheel Quiz Night

St. Richard's Hospice and Pershore No8 benefited to the tune of £750 raised at Pershore Inner Wheel's Quiz Night on the 8th March at Fladbury.  A packed village hall enjoyed a welcoming glass of wine, a raffle, a challenging quiz and excellent fish and chips.  Congratulations to Diane Cartwright and her Inner Wheel team for such a fun evening.    

Care Home feedback

Care Home feedback

What lovely feedback from Austen Court! It's great to know our efforts are appreciated! Hello Thank you so very much, the staff have found them to be invaluable. If we could have some more headbands, Laundry bags that would be wonderful. Please find attached a picture of our Staff wea…

Food Bank Collection at Morrisons

Food Bank Collection at Morrisons

RECORD ITEMS COLLECTED FOR LOCAL FOODBANK We held our latest tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Evesham on Saturday 7th December and records numbers were collected. The generous and kind  Morrisons’ shoppers donated over 1800 items for Evesham Food banks, which loc…

Tree of Light switch on

Tree of Light switch on

                      The weather was awful, and the ground was saturated, but that didn't dampen the spirits for the switch-on ceremony. Attendance was excellent and we were ably assisted by the Prince Henry's Interact Cl…

Crocus planting at Croombe Court

Crocus planting at Croombe Court

Once again, we had a very successful day, planting more than 4000 purple crocus corms in the Croombe Court Walled Gardens. The Rotarian contingent was ably assisted by students from Prince Henry's Interact Club.                  

Farewell to Richard and Jane!

Farewell to Richard and Jane!

Sadly, we have to say goodbye to Richard and Jane, as they move to pastures new. We presented him with a book about Evesham signed by all the members, to acknowledge his outstanding contribution to the club and the town during his thirteen years of membership.  We also gave Jane a plant, which …

Food Bank Collection at Morrisons

Food Bank Collection at Morrisons

The Rotary Club of Evesham held their latest tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Supermarket, Evesham on Saturday 17th August and what a success it was. The generous Morrisons’ shoppers donated over 1300 items for Evesham Food banks’, which local charity Caring Hands wil…

Battle of Evesham

Battle of Evesham

The re-enactment of the Battle of Evesham is now an eagerly-anticipated annual event, and the attendance continues to grow - this year, there were nearly 17,000 visitors! The main event was of course the Battle, with more mounted knights and footsoldiers in authentic costumes than ever before. Wande…

R&L Holt Tomatoes

R&L Holt Tomatoes

On the 24th July 14 members visited the vast glasshouse complex outside Evesham where the Holt family of Springhill Nurseries grows tomatoes for the British market. We were greeted by Felicity Holt and taken round the glasshouses by Chris, the manager of the site. The length of the glasshouses seen…

Masterchef final

Masterchef final

Wimbledon was the theme for 2019 Cook Off at TDMS. The finalists from Years 7, 8 and 9 quietly and efficiently worked their through two hours of a baking session with excellent results. The finished bakes were amazing with good textures and flavour. Well done TDMS!       &nbs…

Evesham Community Festival 15 June 2019

Evesham Community Festival, 15 June The weather leading up to the Festival was ominous, but on the day we only had a brief (if heavy) shower to interrupt the fun. We had a great selection of stalls - children's activities, charity stalls and opportunities to buy a variety of craft items. Raph…

Crocuses in bloom!

Crocuses in bloom!

Interact students from both schools and Rotarians together planted five thousand crocus bulbs last October on World Polio Day at Croome Court. The Walled Gardens are now awash with purple, as we saw on a return visit early in March. Chairman Hein van der Steen emphasised the need to remind ours…

Tree of Light Switch-on

Tree of Light Switch-on

On the 6th of December, the traditional Tree of Light switch on took place in Workman Gardens. Over the last twenty years, this event has become a permanent fixture in the Evesham Christmas calendar. The iconic tree at Workman Bridge is enlightening the area once again. MC and Rotarian Patrick Stai…

Rotary Young Writer Competition

Rotary Young Writer Competition

The Rotary Club of Evesham, which is this year celebrating seventy years of serving the local community, invited pupils from the First/Junior schools in the Evesham area to enter this year's Young Writer competition. This is organised by Rotary Nationally and the theme this year was "My Ins…

School visit to Father Christmas

School visit to Father Christmas

Evesham Rotary funded a number of children from the Vale of Evesham school to visit Santa at Smart Trees Grotto. The children were taken by coach from the school and had the opportunity to wander around the fields of fir trees looking for the twelve days of Christmas activities and they were ab…

Food Bank Collection

Food Bank Collection

On Saturday 8th December starting at 9am, the Rotary Club of Evesham, will be holding their annual tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Supermarket, Evesham, to help those in need this Christmas. The collected items will be handed over to local charity Caring Hands, who will distrib…

Crocus Planting at Croome Court

Crocus Planting at Croome Court

Last Wednesday on World Polio Day, students from Prince Henry’s High School and the De Montfort School together with the Rotary Club of Evesham highlighted historic progress towards a polio-free world by planting 5000 purple crocus bulbs to add a splash of colour for all to see next spring whe…

Seventy Year Celebration Dinner

Seventy Year Celebration Dinner

Members and partners enjoyed a convivial dinner at Raphaels. The theme of the evening was how Rotary has contributed to the community over the last seventy years. This was greatly enlivened by our speakers - Alan and Peter R recalling the early days, then more recent memories from Johns D …

Seventy Year Celebrations

Seventy Year Celebrations

On June 17th, we assembled at Raphael's Restaurant to start our celebration of seventy years of serving the community in Evesham. We welcomed guests Jeff and Marsha Fuller from the USA, and Barbara Taylor, our Interact link at Prince Henry's. District Governor Joan Goldsmith gave a fasc…

Masterchef

Masterchef

The Simon de Montfort school held the first Masterchef competition for pupils in years 7 to 9, sponsored by our club. Pupils were excited and, despite the soaring temperatures, produced lovely dishes for judging. The delighted winners received vouchers for their own use, and look forw…

President's Handover Meeting

President's Handover Meeting

Rotarians and partners came together to thank Chris for his year in office and to welcome Hein van der Steen as the new President. We enjoyed an excellent meal at the Beckford Inn and heard about the successes the Club has enjoyed over the last year. Hein gave us an insight into his p…

President's Evening

President's Evening

Members of the Club enjoyed a convivial evening at Dumbleton Hall to celebrate President Chris's year in office. We were joined by the District Governor, his wife, and a number of members from Pershore Rotary Club. The District Governor presented John Darby, a member of the Club, with a Pau…

D1100 District Conference

Seventeen members of the club travelled to Bournemouth last weekend for the annual D1100 District Conference. The Evesham members know how to enjoy themselves! We all thoroughly enjoyed the time that we were able to spend together, though we may take a few days to recover from too many late nig…

TOL Charities Night

TOL Charities Night

On Friday evening around 20 local charities who have been supported by our Tree of Light appeal came together at Evesham Rowing Club to celebrate another successful year in the history of the Tree of Light. It was an opportunity for them to chat with each other, as well as giving the members of the …

Successful Tin Collection for Local Foodbanks

Successful Tin Collection for Local Foodbanks

The Rotary club of Evesham held their annual tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Supermarket, Evesham last Saturday and what a success it was. The generous supermarket shoppers donated over 1150 items for Evesham Foodbanks’, which local charity Caring Hands will distribute to …

Young Writers' Competition

Young Writers' Competition

ROTARY YOUNG WRITERS' COMPETITION The Rotary Club of Evesham invited all 23 First and Primary schools in the Evesham area to participate in this years national competition.   The theme this year was "A Different Perspective", pupils could write either a poem or a piece of prose …

Tree of Light Switch On

Tree of Light Switch On

                   What a collection of chains!                                    Prince Henry's High School Choir President Chris Bloomfield, DG …

Foodbank Collection

Foodbank Collection

TIN AND NON PERISHABLE ITEMS COLLECTION FOR LOCAL FOODBANKS On Saturday 9th December, the Rotary Club of Evesham, will be holding their annual tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Supermarket, Evesham, to help those in need this Christmas. The collection will be between 11am and 3p…

Visit of PHHS Interact

Visit of PHHS Interact

Gilly Russell, President of PHHS Interact Club and Senior Vice President Isobel Bromfield visited the club yesterday and gave us a superb update on the work of their club over the last year, and their plans for next year. Interact raised a fantastic £3365 last year which is their best result …

Halloween!

Halloween!

The Club enjoyed a superb Halloween evening with many ghoulish outfits on show. A little worrying was that some people looked scarier without the fancy dress!                                   …

£6500 raised for Rory!

£6500 raised for Rory!

Last Friday evening 100 people attended our diiner/dance/auction in aid of the Rory The Robot appeal. This appeal is raising money for a robotic system to operate on Prostate Cancer patients, using just keyhole surgery. We are delighted to be able to report that we raised a fantatsic sum of £…

Superb Effort for Foodbank

Members of The Rotary Club spent a number (of very happy) hours at Morrisons collecting items for Caring Hands in the Vale. As ever, the people of Evesham were very generous in their support for those who are in need, and left tins, packets, household goods and so on. We are delighted to be able to …

Foodbank Collection this Saturday!

Foodbank Collection this Saturday!

On Saturday  8th July, the Rotary Club of Evesham will be holding their tin and non perishable items collection at Morrisons Supermarket Evesham, to help those in need. The collection will be between 11am and 3pm and the collected items will then be handed over to local charity Caring Hands, w…

Dementia Friends

Dementia Friends

At the Club's latest meeting Jo Hughes from the Alzheimer's Society and Sue Amor from Dementia Action Alliance spoke to members about dementia and its impact on people's lives. Jo mentioned that there are around 800,000 known people living with Dementia in the UK & around 9,000 in th…

Young Writers' Competition

Young Writers' Competition

First Schools in the Bredon Hill Cluster were invited to take part in the Rotary Young Writer Competition with the theme this year of  "Reflection". The key Stage 2 winner was Alisa Preedy of Eckington C of E First School. Her entry will be taken forward to the Ro…

Young Chef Competition

Young Chef Competition

Members Val Larner and Joyce Davey recently supported the Young Chef competition at Prince Henry's High School. There were some incredibly delicious dishes produced by the students!                         …

Boules - end of season!

On Monday 5 September, the Waterside piste was witness to a staggering boules performance. Evesham’s strongest team of the season turned out to ensure that the last match would restore the honour of the club after a strong start had tailed off to a string of losses. The visitors had had a poor…

Award for Jenny Ashman

Award for Jenny Ashman

Many people in Evesham and the surrounding area will know Jenny Ashman, one of the main fundrasiers for the County Air Ambulance, and a great friend and supporter of the Rotary Club of Evesham. The President Steve Davies, Treasurer Martin King and Past District Governor Jan Harris we…

International Visit from Twinned Clubs

International Visit from Twinned Clubs

2016 was Evesham's year to host the annual International visit of the five clubs involved in our European twinning arrangement. Evesham hosted 31 Rotarians from our twinned clubs in Norway, Belgium, Germany and The Netherlands.  It was a wonderful weekend with old and new friends from thes…

Best Website Award!

Best Website Award!

At last weekend's District 1100 Conference in Weymouth, we were once again given The Best Club Website Award! Thank you to everyone for all of the stories - keep them coming!       

Robotics Comptetition

Robotics Comptetition

Once again, members of the Club supported De Montfort School by supplying judges for the robotics competition held at the school. 21 teams from across England from as far away as Colchester, Warrington and Bedford took part. The task for the robots was different for this year's competition, with…

Tree of Light Presentations

Tree of Light Presentations

Over the last few weeks, the Club has been presenting some of the cheques from the Tree of Light to local charities. We have been able to hear some more about the work that is happening with these charities, and how the money presented to them will help them with their work. Most local charities hav…