From our Files: Hedging bets...rocketing rates...roofless act...Bronze Age relics
50 YEARS AGO
A GORSE bush barrier to keep cars off the New Forest was suggested at a meeting of the New Forest Consultation panel.
At present ditches and dragons teeth are employed for the purpose. But cars can still get onto the open Forest through side roads.
But Mr D. West from the National Farmers Union said if gorse bush hedges were put close to the road animals could emerge from them straight into traffic
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“BEFORE long you are going to have the position in Highcliffe where small traders will not be able to afford to pay their rates,” said Mr R. Pickering, a former Highcliffe Chamber of Trade president, warned members at their annual meeting.
If it was not for the grant from the national exchequer their rates would now be over 92p in the £.
In 1970, said Mr Pickering, his shop had been rated at £266 whereas today it was rated at £576 and the rage charge was 54.44 in the £.
“The small trader has been hit very hard,” he said. He said items such as education, police and fire services, should be moved from rates to taxes.
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ONLY by the grace of God had serious accidents between swimmers and speed boats off Hurst Beach been avoided, vice chairman of the NFDC’s Council Amenities Committee Mr E. Nabney warned at a recent meeting.
Mr W. Symonds, an observer at the meeting said: “These people come tearing along the beach, possibly among swimmers in fast motor boats and probably towing water skiers.
“Where they come from nobody knows and where they disappear to nobody knows.
“Unless we have some sort of visible warden or a police boat bigger and faster than those people causing a nuisance I don’t know what can be done about it.”
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LYMINGTON magistrates heard on Monday how police had seen a mini car being driven towards Everton with a “young couple seated too close together” in the front.
Insp D. Smith said the driver was seated with his back to the driver’s door facing a girl who was sitting between the two front seats.
His left arm was round the girl’s waist and his right hand resting on the gear stick. The girl had both hands on the driving wheel.
The man pleaded guilty to driving a car in such a position to be not in proper control of it and driving without due care and attention. He was fined £40.
25 YEARS AGO
AFTER 52 years working on the A&T it’s beginning to show so reporter / photographer Brian Down has reluctantly decided to work part-time from his home.
Brian revealed how he joined the paper as a 16-year-old on a wage of £1 a week after being given a spelling test by then editor Charles Curry, a rigorous disciplinarian addressed by staff as ‘Sir.’
Brian recalled: “Forty years I took over the sports column and have attended a match virtually every Saturday in season since.
“Amusing memories include the sight of Mrs Barton incensed at the burly footballing son being felled by a injudicious tackle at Lymington, rushing on to the pitch and beating the offender around the head with a corner flag post.”
Brian is pictured with the then-mayor of Lymington John Nesbitt as he presented Brian with a clock with a specially inscribed plaque for his services to journalism.
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AMPRESS railway bridge at Lymington claimed another victim on Tuesday, slicing off the aluminum roof of a forty-foot lorry.
The driver of the lorry declined to comment to an A&T reporter at the scene saying: “I’m in s***t enough already without speaking to you.”
The 38-ton vehicle had a ten wheel trailer which had a height of 15 inches feet 3 inches which is precisely 12 inches higher than the maximum allowed under the bridge.
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A NUMBER of bronze aged cooking stones have been found by a digger operator in the New Forest, his second discovery of this kind in recent years.
Gavin Howell, was helping to clear some rhododendron bushes for the Forestry Commission in the north of the Forest when he came across the stones.
The stones are relics from an ancient water heating system. Once they would have been heated in a fire and then dropped into a pool of water.
Mr Howell recognized their distinctive markings from a previous find he made in the Forest a few years ago.
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MANY areas across Dorset and Hampshire were flooded due to torrential rain and thunderstorms early on Wednesday evening.
Lightning struck power cables causing arching and thousands of pounds of damage was caused to a New Milton pharmacy.
At A. K.Rishi pharmacy on Station Road part of the ceiling collapsed, the whole carpet was soaked, the perfume cabinet was gutted and all the shop items were soiled.
In Gore Road where the water was a foot deep New Milton police said it was like driving down a river. Dozens of drain covers were forced off by the pressure of the water.
