Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our Members.
Well our annual exhibition was a great success with lots of new faces dropping in to see the exhibits. Darren Butler’s project on the streets and people featured some large scale maps of popular streets and areas at the turn of the last century. Darren had located houses and the names of the people who lived in them; the whole project was very well received. Darren is planning to further develop the project to include other streets and areas for next year.
Seeing the Streets Names of South Staffordshire Book on sale at the Annual Exhibition gave me an idea!. Do you know the origin of the name of your own or any other street in the Villages? Many names were originally given by the developers or the land owners. The background to the names of such obvious streets like Sutherland Road and Leveson Avenue are clear and well recognised – but other backgrounds are less well known. Can you help us with the origins of any street names even if it’s folk lore? We would like to hear from you please give us a call or drop us a line.
One of our Evening Speakers last month was Paul Bedford. Paul is an expert on the names on the local war memorials particularly the First World War and he has lots of background information on the names and families. But he is still looking for local family to help fill in some of the mystery names. If you have a relation who died during WW1 then you may like to get in touch with Paul. paulbedford11@hotmail.co.uk
On our website www.cheslynhay.info we are now dedicating a page to ‘Memories’ and would therefore appreciate any contributions from anyone who can recall how things were in our village of yesteryear.
We are fortunate to have some copies of Frank Morris’s excellent book ‘The Story of Cannock United Reformed Church’. It is a hard backed book with 647 pages that include photographs and everything to do with the churches around the Cannock area, which of course includes Cheslyn Hay and Great Wyrley. There are lists of preachers, the Library Register from 1885, lists of Sunday School pupils from the 1800s, anyone signing the Band of Hope Pledge from1850, Members of the Church from1816, Baptisms from1815, Marriages from 1901 and also where Church Members have been married in other Churches from1784, Burials from 1833 and even football teams and leagues. A must for any local family historian. It cost £17 to publish but we are now selling it at £5. Unfortunately the cost of posting them is prohibitive.
The Editor—Rob Allan. rwallan@lineone.net

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