Ted Stonard (1919-2013)
Staff at Letchworth Museum were very sad to hear that our longest-serving volunteer, Ted Stonard, had passed away at the end of September. He had kept in touch since deciding to “have a rest” from volunteering, and had spoken of visiting us during the summer.
You may have seen the article about Ted in this year’s Spring Outlook Magazine: http://www.north-herts.gov.uk/outlook_spring_2013_web-2.pdf , which profiled Ted, and how he had volunteered for the museum for almost 30 years.
A Londoner by birth, Ted moved to Stevenage in 1952 where he continued to live with wife Doreen. As a young man, Ted lived through some of the most crucial events of the Second World War; he was at Dunkirk and at Alamein, and was a prisoner of war in Italy and Poland. Ted donated his memoirs and photographs to the Second World War Experience Centre near Weatherby, so you can read extracts and see some of them online:
http://www.war-experience.org/history/keyaspects/dunkirk/
http://www.war-experience.org/history/keyaspects/nafrica0642/pagetwo.asp
Ted retired from a career at British Aerospace in the 1980s, and saw an advertisement for volunteers at Letchworth Museum. This was when the museum was involved in excavations in Baldock. He had always been interested in archaeology and history, so thought he would apply:
“I had a fantastic time digging, sorting through artefacts, repairing pottery and cleaning. The dig lasted about eight months, and then I just decided to stay on…”
When asked why he had volunteered for so long, Ted said that it was because of his interest in history, and because over the years he has been made to feel so welcome, meeting so many nice people along the way. Staff will be attending his funeral tomorrow. We will all miss him very much.
Ted’s farewell tea party at Letchworth Museum in 2012
Volunteer Vicky with her favourite Ichthyosaur skull
At long last our extensive geology collection is now almost completely catalogued and on the computer, thanks to the hard work of volunteer Vicky Fish. Vicky has been coming to the Burymead store every Monday for the last year, carefully cataloguing the fossils, geology and stratigraphy. Her experience here (and at Ashwell Museum) helped her win a coveted place on the Leicester University post-grad Museum Studies course, which she starts on Monday. Thanks to Vicky we now know that the collection includes fossils of large marine reptiles (Plesiosaur and Carcharodon megalodon) found in Letchworth and Baldock dating back 90 million years, when this area was sub-tropical, and covered in 100 metres of warm water. We wish her the best of luck for the future.
A dedicated team of local history buffs are helping staff at Hitchin Museum to organise and repack the archive collection.
Archive Project Volunteers
Many of the group are from the Hitchin Historical Society, but they have been joined by young student Chris, who is hoping to work in archives after finishing his studies.
The team brings together a wealth of knowledge of local history as well as other skills such as being able to read Latin and decipher old legal documents.
This project is thanks to a grant from EERAC, the East of England Regional Archive Council. As the team work, they are going to be re-packing the documents in archival quality folders and boxes purchased by the grant. The project will help preserve this eclectic North Herts collection and make for an accessible and interesting Study Room in the new museum.