1999: Gold top heroine

  By Newspapers

A MILKWOMAN known as Maid Marion lived up to her famous name when she spotted a house fire during her round and led an elderly couple to safety.

Marion Sanderson, whose business is called Maid Marion Dairy, was delivering milk in Oxenholme early on Tuesday morning when she heard a smoke alarm. She opened the letter box of Len and Hannah Fothergill‘s Scar View Road home and could see smoke.

Marion, 45, of Staveley, dashed to the rear of the bungalow and hammered on the bedroom window, waking the couple. Mr Fothergill, 73, managed to get to the door and Marion helped him out before plunging into the smoke-logged building.

“I got him outside and asked where his wife was,” said Marion. “She had got out of the bedroom and was half way through the living room and I helped her out. It was nasty and there was a lot of smoke. They were a bit shocked.”

She admitted she had been reluctant to talk about her good deed but added: “In actual fact it’s quite good for the industry because it reminds people that we are there early in the morning if something like this does happen.”

Marion had also woken neighbours Raymond and Christina Barker. Mr Barker ran round with coats to keep the Fothergills warm and waited at the end of the road to direct the fire engine, while Mrs Barker dialled 999. They then provided everyone with cups of tea.

Mr and Mrs Fothergill were both admitted to Kendal’s Westmorland General Hospital with smoke inhalation and Mr Barker was kept in because of complications with asthma. He was said to be feeling much better later in the week.

“I just want to thank them all,” said Mrs Fothergill, 84, after her ordeal.

The Fothergills’ daughter, Sylvia Newhouse, said the rescue was even luckier because Marion was running late that morning.

Kendal fire officers said the kitchen blaze was probably caused by an electrical fault with a gas-fired boiler.

Two firefighters wearing breathing apparatus put out the fire using a hose reel. The blaze was confined to the kitchen which was smoke damaged.

Extracted from Westmorland Gazette, 9 January 1999

Join our Oxenholme Past & Present facebook group

  By Uncategorised

If you live or work in Oxenholme, have ever lived or worked in Oxenholme or have ancestors from Oxenholme, then we would love you to join our Oxenholme Past & Present facebook group.

Join our friendly Oxenholme Past & Present facebook group now

Have you memories, photographs or family stories that you would like to share? Then we would love to hear from you!

Note: Although the group is classified by Facebook as a ‘closed group’, this simply means that you have to join the group to contribute and read posts etc. Any posts or comments you make show up only in the group, not on your own Facebook timeline.

Quiz Night! Saturday 11 November 2017

  By Events

Natland & Oxenholme Table Tennis Club are holding a Quiz Night on Saturday 11 November 2017 at Natland Village Hall starting at 7.30pm.

There will be a Pie & Pea Supper (with veggie alternative).

Cost is £5 each with teams of around 4 members.

Tickets can be bought from the Post Office at Natland or call Carol Catnach (see poster image).

Natland and Oxenholme W I Meeting : 20 September 2017

  By Women's Institute

President Kirsten Cannon welcomed 26 members and 20 visitors to the open meeting.

President Kirsten congratulated members on the group and individual successes at the recent Westmorland County Show – 1 Gold, 3 Silver and a Red awarded for the group entry of biscuits.  She also congratulated members Joan Airey and Kate Toms on over 20 entries which had received many awards.

President Kirsten then welcomed Maurice Steele who gave an audio/visual presentation entitled ‘It should have been stopped’.  Maurice accompanied by his ‘team members’ Sally Harpon and Old Grump, took members on a journey through Lakeland from the Ice Age, to the present day posing the question what sort of Lakeland would we have if various decisions had been stopped.

Through stunning photography showcasing the beauty of nature and accompanied by poignant music, Maurice asked members to consider how our landscape would look if land clearance, mining, railways, roads, mass tourism and other factors had been stopped.

Elaine Close gave the vote of thanks.

The competition for a sheep was won by Lynne Procter with Joan Ratcliffe in second place.

Raffle prizes were won by Nancy Toft, Pauline Causey and Betty Prickett.

Date of next meeting is October 18th at 7.15pm in Natland Village Hall when the guest speaker Pam Hetherington will speak on Foot care and Podiatry.

2016: £60,000 play area opens in South Lakes village

  By Newspapers

As published by The Westmorland Gazette, Friday 28 October 2016

CIVIC DUTY: Councillor Sylvia Emmott pictured (left) testing the new play area with the Mayor of Kendal Cllr Stephen Coleman and Emma Turner of Oxenholme Play Area Development (OPAD) who helped to raise the funding. Copyright Westmorland Gazette. 23/10/2016
JON GRANGER

A new-look £60,000 play area has opened in a South Lakeland town. Excited children joined councillors for the grand opening of the new play area at Bolefoot in Oxenholme on Saturday afternoon.

The community group Oxenholme Play Area Development (OPAD) helped raise funds for the project through a ‘crowdfunding’ appeal. It raised enough money to add a ‘space net’ climbing area to the scheme, which also includes brand new slides, swings, climbing frames, seating and shelters. There was also a £25,000 contribution from South Lakeland District Council (SLDC), £5,000 from Kendal Town Council and other funding from local councillors’ member budgets, charitable trusts, leisure organisations and local company donations.

OPAD chair and mum-of-three Emma Turner, said: “It has been a real community effort and lots of people have got involved, contributing funding and giving ideas about what they’d like to see in the park. We’ve been helped by SLDC, the town council, local businesses and charitable trusts and residents in Oxenholme have also paid towards it, we even had a sweetie jar in the local shop for donations. It should be something the whole community can be proud of because they have played such a big part in making this happen. The play area will be great for young people in the village. Because of Oxenholme’s relative isolation, it is the only park that is easily accessible and it is also the only real community space that we have where people of all ages can get together.’’

Playground manufacturers, HAGS SMP, designed the new play space incorporating ideas and suggestions from consultations run by OPAD in both 2014 and 2015, for a playground suitable for youngsters aged up to 14 that is accessible to both disabled and non-disabled users. Cllr Brenda Gray, SLDC ward councillor for Oxenholme and Natland, has also supported the project and contributed £3,000 funding through her last three years’ member allowances.

Oxenholme Play Area Development (OPAD) organiser Emma Turner with her son Isaac 6, and village youngsters who celebrated the opening event.

 

2016: Tractor driver receives suspended prison sentence for causing death of pedestrian at Troutbeck Bridge

  By Newspapers

 

A TRACTOR driver who caused the death of a pedestrian in a Lake District road tragedy has been sentenced by a judge.

Angus James Freeman, a 33-year-old farmer, appeared at Carlisle Crown Court today.

He pleaded guilty to causing the death of 59-year-old great grandmother Elaine Steele by careless driving at Troutbeck Bridge, near Windermere, on February 6 last year.

Holiday park worker Miss Steele, of Oxenholme, was walking on a pavement alongside the A591 when she was struck by Freeman’s five-tonne Massey Ferguson tractor.

She suffered severe head and neck injuries, and was pronounced dead at the scene.

The court heard Freeman had inexplicably failed to observe a “give way” sign and markings immediately before joining the A591 and striking Miss Steele.

But despite her heartbroken family wondering why, Freeman had no recollection nor explanation for exactly what happened on a route he used every day.

Having heard considerable mitigation on behalf of Freeman – a man of previous good character – Judge Barbara Forrester suspended a 24-week prison sentence for 12 months.

Freeman, of Town End Farm, Troutbeck, was also given a one-year driving ban and must pay £545 costs.

His lawyer, Anthony Haycroft, told the court: “Unfortunately this was a tragedy in the very true sense of the word.”

Westmorland Gazette, 8 August 2016

Christine Hunter, writer and biographer

  By Uncategorised

Selection of Christine Hunter titles …

Christine Hunter, born in 1910, was not only a schoolteacher, but also a writer and biographer. She is understood to have lived at Woodlands (no. 98) Helmside Road in later life.

Among her titles were:

Year Title
1952 Boy from Down Under
Bunty and Peter
Coutier Treasure
Escape to Adventure
1953 Mysterious Neighbours
1955 Come on Spencers
Michael Graham, Police Cadet
1956 Michael Graham, Police Constable
1957 Mystery of Tentenbury Manor
1960 Mystery of Cousin John
1966 Deep Waters
To Life Anew
1968 Years of Our Days
1969 Guiding Light
1972 Annalisa
Gladys Aylward
Secret of Tentenbury Manor
Sparks Flying Upward
1974 Anna’s Family
Bwana Masua
1976 Day Will Dawn
Winding Road

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Undeveloped Plots on Helmside Road

  By Uncategorised

The undeveloped plots on Helmside Road. Photo copyright of Tony Hartley.

The photograph above, courtesy of Tony Hartley, shows the undeveloped plots which lie on the eastern side of Helmside Road, between number 53 (left-hand side) and number 47 (right-hand side). Immediately behind the undeveloped land are the properties on Scar View Road, then Bleaswood Road.

Long-time resident John Bateson tells us the properties were all built between 1968 and 1972 and that this particular piece of land was originally intended for the children’s playground. However, it was deemed to be too close to the road and so has remained undeveloped ever since.

8.8.88

  By Uncategorised

In her fascinating short history of Oxenholme: The Railway Village (1995), Laura Oldham wrote about “Auntie Vi’s” shop and went on to say that Vi Atkinson ‘had an unusually distinctive birthday, beng born on the eighth day of the eighth month of 1888’.

However, further investigation reveals that Vi Atkinson, who was born Violet Emma Lord, was born on the eighth day of the eighth month, but in 1887 not 1888. Vi, who married Thomas Atkinson, died in 1978 aged 90. They lived at Helm Garth in Helmside Road.

But another Oxenholme resident, Florence Jellett, born Florence Caley, was born on the eighth day of the eighth month in 1888, according to her entry on the 1939 National Identity Register. Florence married railway porter George Jellett in 1918. They lived at 18 Helmside Cottages. Florence died in 1988, aged 99.

lord and jellett