When the daughter of 79 year old Theodore and Lilian Dekins asked, 'who are we?' and decided to research her family tree, they searched Google for Dekins connections and came across 'Eddie Deakin' on 'Wyenot News'. Investigations showed that well known local personality, Eddie, who died in November 2005, was Theodore's second cousin.

Further investigation brought to light that a silver rose bowl trophy, which was first presented in 1929 to 'T.E. Farmer' at Ross Hospital Carnival was donated by Mr. and Mrs. E Dekins of the Kyrle Picture Palace, and that 'E. Dekins' was Theodore's great uncle.

The question was, could this rose bowl be traced. Following many failed leads, the trail looked to have gone cold, until a family friend succeeded in contacting Carnival Committee Chairman, Mel Hodges. Mel immediately knew exactly where the trophy was. It was in safe keeping and was easily verified as being the particular rose bowl in question. The bowl was in fact due to be presented to, Ross Pre-school Playgroup this year, for coming 1st in Class One at this year's carnival and Theodore was asked if he would like the opportunity to present it.

On Monday, 17th September, an official presentation was arranged at the Larruperz Centre, where Theodore officially handed the trophy to Playgroup Leader, Vicki Page. Members of Theodore's family attended the evening event, along with the founder of Ross Pre-school Playgroup, Mrs. Joyce Thomas OBE DL, playgroup leaders, Vicki Page and Pauline Williams, with some of the children who had been on this years carnival float.

It is interesting to note from the inscription on the trophy that Ross Town Carnival, had in fact begun as a fund raising event specifically for Ross Cottage Hospital.

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Some regular readers may currently be finding the clickable buttons on pages of 'Wyenot News' and 'Wyenot' in general a little untidy, with a mixture of both upeer and lower case lettering. If this is the case, the answer is to right click your internet browser icon, clear your 'temporary internet files' and then refresh the page.

The reason is that, with higher resolution video becoming more widespread with the advance in computer technology, things appear smaller on the screen. My own eyesight was perfect until I reached my early 40s but is deteriorating rapidly with age and I am sure this happens to other people as well, so I have tried to make the buttons more easily readable for all. (I am also growing more and more deaf and having difficulty finding a corner of my mouth with enough teeth left on both jaws to chew. It's horrible, growing old!)

New visitors to 'Wyenot' will not have a problem but regular visitors, especially those who do not deliberately maintain a clutter free computer, may have the original button image files stored in their 'temporary internet files', which are there to speed the loading of graphics when revisiting a web page. Clearing these will force a download of the new graphics next time you visit 'Wyenot'. This is also, incidentally, why some people cannot immediately see the new issue of the news when it is first uploaded and other changes, when they are made.

This week, with the festival and events season coming to an end, is the beginning of a quiet local news period. Personally, I am not too unhappy about this because it gives me something of a short break after the busy summer of rushing from event to event before the fireworks and then Christmas season kicks in. Tina and I have, in fact, already taken a couple of days out recently - one to visit my dad in Essex and the next, her parents in Bromsgrove. This made a nice break during which we were able to forget local issues completely just for a couple of days - the first time in over a year.

Although there is not an awful lot going on at this time of year, please continue to send in your stories and events to let both local people and the world know what is happening locally. Between us we can keep Ross an interesting town to visit and try to stop it from dying completely after the poor summer and possible looming national foot and mouth crisis.

The video I have been putting on 'Wyenot News' is proving to be extremely popular, so I intend to keep improving on this area. Funnily enough, everybody seems to think I enjoy photography and I have been labled a 'photographer' but this is simply not true. Photography for me is simply a means to an end for 'Wyenot'. I just do it because I cannot afford getting somebody else, and probably better to do it for me. I do however quite enjoy filming and editing video - probably because there has been less of it and it has not had the time to become a chore.

I am currently part way through a couple of video projects for Wyenot. The slide show type films I already have on the 'Scenic and Historic' pages of Wyenot have proved to be particularly popular, so I have decided to expand on this. The main video project I am currently working on is a tourism type film, designed to try to boost interest in the local area even more than the photos of local places and news are already doing. I am starting this project off with a short film about Symonds Yat, for which I am currently about half way through the filming stage and hope to finish over the coming weekend - depending on the weather. Before the beginning of next summer, I hope to cover most local areas, including Ross Town itself.

Like everything else on 'Wyenot', the video will be entirely home-brew, roll-your-own - produced without outside production help. (Even the first two computers used for building Wyenot were home-made, in my living room - I only buy them these days because it is cheaper than buying the individual components to build.) Tina, already known world wide for her 'dancing' will be interviewing local people to show the world what a nice place Ross and its surrounds are to visit. If you would like your local area or event to be covered as a part of the series of short films, please let us know.

Finally. Going back to our short break away from Ross. We did not take a camera this year but f you would like to see our holiday snap from last year's short break on the Jurassic Coast . . .

The students of John Kyrle High School played host to 21 students from Betzdorf, Germany, between their arrival on Friday 7th and Monday, 17th September. Whilst waiting for the coach to take them all home, I spoke to Marie Gruenter, who had been paired with Kirsty Priest, my son, Michael's girlfriend about her visit to Ross-on-Wye.

Marie told me that a couple of days after their arrival, she and the other German student were given tours of the town, so that they got to know it quite well. They were also treated to a day out in Gloucester, where they enjoyed a visit to the cathedral and then given a tour of the waterways museum.

On Saturday afternoon, after a quick visit to Ross Sports Centre to take a rugby team photo and a look at the skate park, Marie, kirsty, Alan and I went to Linton Village Fete, which was opened by Sir Peter de la Billiere. We went along there as Alan had been asked to judge the photographic competition. After a quick glance at the entries, we left Alan to do his duty whilst we enjoyed a game of 'Play your cards right' and a couple of goes on the tombola. Marie seemed to be enjoying herself.

We left Linton after about an hour and took Marie to the Bridge at Wilton to introduce her to local artist, Doug Eaton who was exhibiting his works as part of h.Art. We dropped Marie and Kirsty off nearer town to enjoy their last day or so together.

On Monday afternoon, we made our way up to John Kyrle High School for Alan to take a group shot of the students and to say goodbye to Marie.

Last week we visited Wobage Makers Gallery and Broome Farm to take a look at their work during h.Art. This week we went along to the Bridge at Wilton to see local artist and friend Doug Eaton's exhibition. Doug also submitted four of his paintings to the Open Exhibition at Hereford Museum and Art Gallery. All four were accepted and Doug has won the Rehau award as a result of one of his submissions.

Doug told us that h.Art is a great help to get works into galleries as well as make many new contacts. He is very pleased about the news of his award and we are very pleased for him.

The following photographs show Doug at the Bridge at Wilton with some of his works.

The absolute deadline for Wyenot News stories and other items is 12:00, midday on Tuesday, for inclusion in the following day's edition.

PLEASE NOTE HOWEVER: This is an absolute deadline and not the time I am asking for articles to be sent in. Mondays and Tuesdays here at 'Wyenot News' are Hell with by far, the most events I cover occurring at the weekend. The photography that the public sees happening is only one tiny part of the whole picture (please excuse the pun) of running this weekly news publication and the bits of prep that people do not see, are actually the most time consuming part of getting the story out.

If at all possible, please send your story in as early as you can, rather than wait until the very last minute, so that I can have at least a fighting chance of getting to bed before 3:00 am every Tuesday and Wednesday morning after what has lately become two 18 hour working days on the trot.

Thank you very much for your understanding and help.

Alan

DO YOU HAVE A STORY FOR WYENOT NEWS?

If you have a local news item or story you can submit it here
or call Alan or Tina on 01989 763217

There is no charge for publishing either news items or What's On Events
This is a Free Service for the local community!

Wyenot News, 1, Hillview Road, Ross-on-Wye, Herefordshire. HR9 7EY

If you would like to order prints from Wyenot News photographs, please click here.

Prints are only available for photographs taken by Wyenot News (Not of those which have been sent in by readers).

Prints of 'people' photographs are only available to those directly involved in the news event covered. i.e. I do not sell prints of people to the general public.