President's Page
M.W. Hanson 3 Church Cottages, Church Road, Boreham, Essex CM3 3EG
It is with considerable regret that we have to announce the passing on of Peter Glassborow
earlier this year. He was Honorary Treasurer 1959-1970 and President 1970-1973. He
was perhaps better known as a bee-keeper and indeed gave one presidential address on
this subject as well as the early history of the Field Club. An obituary and appreciation
will appear in the next Essex Naturalist.
I would like to thank all individuals who contributed to the success of the Club's fifth
annual exhibition and social and the first at our new venue, the Church of the Blessed
Sacrament. As usual it was very well attended (both exhibitors and visitors) and I think
the extra room afforded by the church hall was much appreciated. Once again the lively
atmosphere made it a pleasurable experience for all concerned. It has become an important
focus for the club's recording endeavours enabling recorders and members to meet
socially as well as being able to debate the latest developments in biological recording
in the county. I also appreciate actually meeting the faces behind the names, as probably
do many other members!
I have to admit that I am very disappointed that the club has still been unable to secure
a home for its collection and library. The situation is also not improving. I have had
recent notification that the club is required to retrieve further items from the former
collections held by the Corporation of London at the Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge
Museum. The list of objects is unfortunately substantial, including many items of
taxidermy, material gathered by Joseph Ross and DJ Scourfield, molluscs, lichens, mosses
and other botanical items plus a great deal of other miscellaneous material. I am writing
this Presidents Page just before Christmas and rather like events two thousand years ago
there is 'no room at the inn'- we simply don't have the facility to store this extra material!
The club will hopefully be able to help defray the costs of storing specimens by the sale
of items such as cased stuffed birds without data, etc. However these further items will
need to be retrieved some time in the near future, which means more storage is needed.
As what I hope is not a last resort I have to admit I have contacted my local authority
with a view to building a storage facility in my garden. It would be about 1 Om x 5m and
I doubt would hold the entire archive so even if planning permission were granted (and
I'm not optimistic about that since I live in a conservation area) the collections would
have to be slimmed down considerably.
However on a positive note at least we've managed to keep the collections largely intact
and in Essex. Chelmsford, the birthplace of radio, has just lost the historic Marconi
collection, said to be worth £6 million, to the Museum of the History of Science at
Oxford after eight years trying to find a permanent home in the borough!
Good Luck and Best Wishes for 2005 and thank you to all our members and recorders
for your support over the last year.
2 Essex Field Club Newsletter No. 46, January 2005