From Our Files: Eggstra special...colour TV ban...Fawley ‘not pretty enough’
Then and Now (with St Barbe Museum + Art Gallery): Lymington RNLI Lifeboat Station, 1965
Pictured here at its opening, Lymington RNLI lifeboat station was established in 1965 with the introduction of a D-class inshore lifeboat, re-establishing lifesaving coverage in the western Solent following the closure of the nearby Keyhaven station in 1918.
Opened in 2006, the current purpose-built boathouse provided improved facilities for the crew and the lifeboat.
This year, Lymington RNLI celebrates its 60th anniversary and is equipped with the Atlantic 85 class B-882 lifeboat, David Bradley.
Over its 60 years the station has operated six different lifeboats, launched on-service 1,540 times and saved 235 lives.
25 YEARS AGO
Reginald Tom House and his brother Herb, who died in 1985, were known locally as ‘the Twins’.
“They did everything together,” explained his nephew Bob Darby. “They went to the same school, they worked together, lived together for 80 years and drank together at Highcliffe Club,” he added.
Reginald died last week at the age of 94. He will be buried beside his brother in New Milton. The two brothers worked at Edgars Dairies
When Reginald was admitted to Lymington Hospital he was christened ‘granddad of the ward’ by staff who loved his affable nature.
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Parish councilors in Fawley have been warned that attempts to get Fawley included in the proposed national park would be futile because the village is not “pretty enough”.
Speaking at their meeting last week, New Forest Committee officer Mandy Jago advised that they would have to be “realistic” about their chances saying it would be “an uphill struggle”.
She said Fawley would fail to meet the Countryside Agency’s criteria for natural beauty.
Chairman Philip Pearce-Smith said the omission of Hythe and Fawley in a draft boundary was “disastrous.”
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Firemen at Milford carnival enjoying a “dance and confetti battle” on the village green had to dash off to fight a fire on the clifftop.
Many merry-makers from the carnival joined them, armed with sticks and branches of gorse to stamp the fire out.
Around 30,000 gallons of water were poured on the fire which was probably caused by a discarded cigarette.
50 YEARS AGO
The question of the provision of a refuge for battered wives and their children has been referred by Christchurch Council’s Policy and Resources committee to the Housing Committee.
This being International Women’s Year, the Married Woman’s Association has written asking if provision had been made for a shelter, with the letter declaring: “Violence against women is the most evil privilege men give themselves.”
Town Clerk, Mr J MacFadyen, said the answer to the letter was that they had done nothing at present.
Coun R Street, a solicitor, said it was sometimes “difficult to know how to advise women who had obviously got to get away from the matrimonial home. “If we can set aside some sort of accommodation I would be very much in favour of it,“ he said.
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Chickens at South Sway Orchard have been known to lay ‘treble yolkers’ before but when one of the 200 Isa Brown layers produced an egg weighing four and three quarter ounces owner Kathy Gulliver thought they’d hit the record books.
However the largest egg lain in Britain was recorded in 1896 when a black Minorca laid a five yolked egg weighing nearly 12 ounces.
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Christchurch and Lymington MP Robert Adley has urged the government to impose a ban on people buying colour television sets with Social Services furniture vouchers.
He said many of his constituents had also told him it was “an abuse of their tax money. It is ridiculous that the Chancellor taxes them as luxury goods and yet people are obtaining coloured televisions with these vouchers, using these vouchers using taxpayer’s money.”
He is also asking for a limit on the value of individual items people can buy with the vouchers saying “otherwise people could go along to Sotheby’s and buy a teak writing bureau with them”.


