Celebrating 25 years of classics on the road
Ashbourne Classic Enthusiasts Club
THE Ashbourne Classic Enthusiasts (ACE) car club celebrated its 25th year with a tea party at Clifton Village Hall on Sunday, July 31.
Some 70 members enjoyed afternoon tea to toast the club’s silver anniversary.
Ken Bayliss, founder and president of the club explained that the club started in 1997 with him inviting a few of his friends to join him on a car rally he had planned, driving through the local area. It has now grown to more than 150 members.
The club, which attracts and welcomes all marques of vehicles together with a group of diverse members, is dedicated to an interest in cars.
Members organise a number of car runs, using documented routes, throughout the year, to places of interest, usually finishing up with a pub meal in the evening.
The club also organises annual group trips both within the UK and abroad which last between four and eight days.
In the past members have ventured to France, Belgium and Ireland as well as weeks away in the Cotswolds, Colchester, Northumberland and the North Norfolk coast.
This year a trip to Wales has been organised.
So, if you have a classic car or are just interested in cars and want to find out more about joining the ACE club then please contact Sara Bayliss, club secretary via email saralbayliss@btinternet.com
Swept along by a medley of music Ashbourne U3A
THE August meeting of Ashbourne U3A took place at the Ashbourne Elim Church on Friday, August 5 with about 50 members attending.
The presentation took the form of a musical recital by a couple of folksingers from Derby – Steve and Julie Wigley.
The organisers of the meeting were particularly grateful to Steve and Julie for stepping in at very short notice because the original presenter had developed Covid.
Steve and Julie played a medley of songs, accompanying their own singing on their guitars.
The songs were mainly their own, with one or two old favourites as well. The titles of the songs included “Haul, Lizzie, Haul” about an elephant doing war-work in Sheffield, “Charlie, George and Ginger” about life in the printing industry in Derby, “HMS Billy Ruffian” about a Royal Naval vessel 200 years ago and “Seventies Saturday night”, which is selfexplanatory.
The audience were swept along with the music and some joined in with the choruses.
It was little surprise to learn that Steve and Julie had completed eight albums of their own recordings, over the last 20 years.
A good time was had by all!
The next Friday meeting of Ashbourne U3A will be on the afternoon of Friday, September 2 and will consist of a talk by Danny Wells on the subject of Viscount Curzon of Kedleston Hall.
Heroines who fought a humanist Civil War Ashbourne WI
THE Dovedale Group Meeting was held in St John’s Hall on Thursday, July 28, and was attended by members of the Ashbourne, Tissington and Kniveton and what a lovely evening to get together once again after the pandemic in regular group meetings which are held twice a year.
The speaker for the evening was David Sillen whose presentation was entitled “Cyclones in Calico – American Women in the American Civil War” – the story of the many brave women who nursed the wounded and sometimes fought in the American Civil War.
David is a great enthusiast of the American Civil War, its battles and the outstanding personalities of the war.
The American Civil War was fought between the Union and the Confederacy (states that voted to secede, or ‘the South’) and ran from 1861-1865.
It claimed the lives of 600,000 people which at that time was two per cent of the population.
As David pointed out, we all know of Abraham Lincoln, Robert E. Lee, John Brown and George Armstrong Custer. But have we heard of the women of that era? Probably not apart from Vivien Leigh and Olivia de Havilland who played the idea of ‘women of the South’ – all petticoats and mint julips!
Is the name Permelia Higgerson known to us? Or that of Harriet Tubman? She was an American abolitionist and social activist, born into slavery and escaped, subsequently making some 13 missions to rescue enslaved people, including family and friends, using the network of anti-slavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad. She is quoted as saying: “I freed one thousand slaves. I could have freed one thousand more if only they knew they were slaves”.
Another name we will be familiar with is Harriet Beecher Stowe, an American author and abolitionist whose book ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ brought to light the agonies of the life of the slaves and inspired Americans to address the issue of slavery.
And then there was Captain Sally Louisa Tompkins who died in 1916; a humanitarian, nurse and philanthropist and the first women to have been formally inducted into the Confederate army.
And Phoebe Levy Pember, a member of a prominent American Jewish family from South Carolina, nurse and female administrator of Chimborazo Hospital at Richmond, Virginia. There was also Dorothea Dix, an American advocate who created the first generation of American mental asylums and served as a Superintendent of Army Nurses during the Civil War.
Clarissa Barton was a hospital nurse in the Civil War, a teacher and a patent clerk who founded the American Red Cross.
Rose Greenhow, a confederate spy who, after a voyage to Europe to raise money for the confederate cause, drowned near Wilmington, North Carolina, as she fell from a small boat wearing a skirt which had gold coins stitched into the hem making it extremely heavy.
The wife of Confederate General George Pickett, Lasalle Corbell Pickett who married in 1863 and died in 1931, like many others wrote diaries about the war and in fact Helen Viola Jackson was the last surviving widow of a Civil War veteran overall died in 2020 at the age of 101, the last Civil War widow.
It is for this reason that we have so much information about the American Civil War.
Mary Ann Bickerdyke, was a hospital administrator for Union soldiers during the Civil War and a lifelong advocate for veterans.
It was said that during her work as hospital administrator she ‘swept through the hospital like a cyclone in calico.’
No monthly meeting in August. The next meeting of the Ashbourne WI will take place on Thursday, September 8, at St John’s Hall, Auction Close, Ashbourne DE6 1GQ at 7.30pm when John Wilson will talk about Women’s Refuges. New members and visitors are always welcome.
You may attend up to three meetings as a visitor (fee £2 per visit) before deciding to join.
For further information please send a mail to ashbournewi@yahoo.co.uk.
Club celebrates five special birthdays Ashbourne Tangent Club
This year Ashbourne Tangent Club is celebrating the special birthdays of five members who are 60, 70, 80, 90 and 100 years old.
Ashbourne Tangent is 45 years old this year. Tangent was originally the follow-on club of Ladies Circle.
When ladies reached 45 they moved to Tangent. Nowadays we welcome all ladies to join us.
We meet the first Tuesday of the month for lunch or dinner, depending on the time of the year.
Our usual venue is the Bentley Brook Inn where, as well as the meal, we have speakers, quizzes, trips out Christmas parties, whatever is organised for that month. Occasionally we meet up with 41 Club.
Anyone wishing to join please contact Jacky Brown on 07929 099507.