The day I was the Kentish Gazette!

Like most people in this area, I have featured in the paper several times over the years, from a picture of the back of my head in a school group listening to the proclamation of the Queen’s accession to the throne, to my wedding over 50 years ago.

However the most memorable time was when I was not only in the Gazette but I was the Kentish Gazette!

I was nine and attending Wincheap school, living in Hollow Lane with my parents and brother.

My mother helped to organise a Coronation street party for Hollow Lane and Hollow Mede and went to all the neighbours each week to collect a small amount towards the costs. There were games, tea and fancy dress in Hollow Mede.

My parents made a Roman soldier costume for my brother, and my mother took an old white sheet to the Kentish Gazette office in Canterbury and it was put through the printing press. It printed beautifully that week’s Gazette. My mother used it to make me a dress and made a hat from the Kentish Gazette masthead.

The judges included a lady involved with the paper, but she said it would not be right for her to award me first prize as she would like to do,so she awarded her own special prize.

My photo was taken and was printed in the next paper.

I have cuttings as varied as the Dornier plane which crash-landed on my grandparent’s farm during the war, to family weddings, funerals, anniversaries and a photo of my mother holding my brother when he won a bonny baby competition at Brett’s sports day.

Still buying the Gazette every week and relying on it to keep us up to date with all the local news. Susan Farley Orchard Close, Littlebourne