Hornton Online

Creative ideas and hard work lie behind the funds raised since 2001 for JUMPA (our Jubilee Multi-Purpose Play Area). The total now tops £18,000 - around half of what we need to get construction underway on the hard-surface play area that will sit at the foot of the field directly behind the Pavilion.

Over £8,000 has been raised through a wide range of events and initiatives by committee members and villagers from Hornton and Horley who will benefit from the area once it's built. The remaining £10,000 has come from a grant from Cherwell District Council - a grant that will only be forthcoming once we have all the money in place to start work.

With a fixed expiry date of mid 2006 on the Cherwell money, now we need to pick up speed to raise the rest of the cash. The clear aim is to have all funds in so we can commission plans and a builder and get construction complete by summer 2006.

"That means we have to be in a position to have all the finance in place by this autumn," says JUMPA chairman Steve Woodcock. "We have a series of events planned to keep on bringing in some money but we are also working hard to try to get grant money awarded, from local authorities and other sports grant-givers, although the money available is much in demand and it takes time for decisions to be made."

If anyone has any ideas on who we might approach for grant aid, please get in touch with JUMPA Secretary Jane Perkin (Tel 670701) who is coordinating applications.

In the meantime, here's the outline JUMPA Calendar for the next few months:

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY:

Friday, 11 March, 7.30pm - JUMPA Film Quiz, Dun Cow. Teams of up to four. Entry £2 a head, payable on the night. Raffle. (Part of the Hornton Film Festival that weekend, being run by Pete Whitehead.) Ask Gwyneth if you would like some bar food before or during the Quiz.

Saturday, 12 March - Hornton Film Festival.

Saturday, 23 April, 7pm -Progressive Dinner - funds to JUMPA, the Pavilion and a donation to the Gossip.

June - Annual Golden Mile Run - date and time to be fixed.

26th January '05 - Village Tote - Can You Help?

After several years, Ollie Fickling is stepping down from organising the Pavilion Tote.

This is an important fund-raiser to keep the Pavilion running and ship-shape! We now need someone to volunteer to take over.

Can you help?

If so, more details are available from Ollie (670739) or the Pavilion Secretary Steve Woodcock (670795).

Thanks got to Ollie for his invaluable efforts.

26th January '05 - Rock Down Tomorrow

World music arrives in Hornton tomorrow night, Friday, when Lava play their special blend of tangos, rumbas, blues, flamenco and jazz at Hornton Methodist Church. The show starts at 7.30pm but if you still need a ticket buy it in advance from Julie Stanley to avoid disappointment! You can reach Julie on 01295 670507 or by email at julieharrystan at aol dot com (replace the appropriate words with symbols)

On Friday, February 25, the classical guitar duo Divertimento will be playing the same venue, so make a note in your diaries now!

26th January '05 - Total Star

After several years of dedicated work, Ollie Fickling is stepping down from organising the Pavilion Tote.

We now another total star to volunteer to take over.

The tote is a vital fund-raiser to keep the Pavilion running and ship-shape and organising it is fun. It’s would be especially good for someone new to the village wanting to meet new people because you get to meet almost everyone sometime during the year when you collect their tote subscriptions.

If you can help, more details are available from Ollie on 01295 670739 or the Pavilion Secretary, Steve Woodcock, on 01295 670795.

In the meantime, thanks must go to Ollie for his invaluable efforts.

26th January '05 - Chat Up

The deadline for contributions to the latest edition of The Gossip, Hornton’s very own village newspaper, is this Sunday, January 31, so scribblers have still got time to hand in their contributions. Editors Julie Stanley on 01295 670507 or at julieharrystan at aol dot com (replace the appropriate words with symbols) and Ann Hemmings on 01295 670511 are waiting for those literary pearls to drop through their letter box!

26th January '05 - Watch the Birdy

Results from Hornton’s recent experiment with a mobile speed camera – temporarily installed in Miller’s Lane recently to see just how many motorists broke the 30mph speed limit – will be unveiled at the next parish council meeting.

Parish councillors will convene at the Church Room in Bell Street on Monday week, January 31, at 7.30 pm. All villagers are invited to attend.

26th January '05 - Secret Snifters

What will you be drinking down the Dun Cow the weekend after next? It’s all a closely-guarded secret because that’s the date for the second Hornton Winter Beer Festival and landlord Martin Gelling is keeping the names of the esoteric range of beers he’s bringing in closely under his hat!

All he will say is that real ale fans are in for a treat because there will be at least six real ales to taste on tap - ranging from 3.4-4.6 per cent alcohol - plus some unusual bottled beers. As to what they’re called…well, you’ll have to come along over the weekend to find out!

The festival will run from 7 to 11pm on Friday, February 4, 12noon to 11pm the following day and midday to 10.30pm on the Sunday. Food will also be food available.

Now that the pub is in the Campaign for Real Ale’s national Good Beer Guide, a good turnout of CAMRA supporters is expected, as well as beer fans from closer to home, so see you there!

And from now until the end of the festival, the pub is running a special raffle in aid of Cancer Research and Macmillan Nurses at just £1 per strip. First prize is a three-course dinner for two with a bottle of wine at the Dun Cow and there are lost of other prizes too.

26th January '05 - Church Services

There will be a service at 11am in Hornton Methodist Church this Sunday, January 30th. There will be no service in the Parish Church because at 10,30am there is a Candlemass Benefice Service at Horley.

18th January '05 - Chips with Everything

There will be one special meal on the Dun Cow menu this weekend – bacon sarnies! On Saturday, January 22, the pub is holding a Bacon Sarnie and Chips Evening, so pop along from 7pm onwards for a hearty doorstep or two.

And there's another Dun Cow date to remember next month, when the pub will be hosting the Second Hornton Winter Beer Festival. It will run from 7 to 11pm on Friday, February 4, 12noon to 11pm the following day and midday to 10.30pm on the Sunday. Along with at least six real ales to taste on tap, there will be unusual bottled beers. Food will also be food available.

18th January '05 - Lights, Camera, Not Action

Plans for the inaugural Hornton Film Festival are well under way but the event will only be the big success predicted in last week’s Banbury Guardian if you take part!

Never made a film? We’ll show you! Haven’t got a camera? We’ll lend you one! Don’t know how to edit? It doesn’t matter! No film can be more than five minutes’ long and it’s the taking part that counts.

It can be drama, comedy, documentary, a holiday video. You name it, there’ll be a category in the hotly-contested race for Hornton’s very own answer to the Oscars – the Hornies. OK, it won’t be that hotly contested because it’s all a bit of fun but organiser says there’s been a lot of interest since a big picture story appeared in last week’s Guardian and he’s keen for even more people to dip their toe in the water.

The fun kicks off on Friday, March 12, with a special quiz down at the Dun Cow on a film theme, devised by Hornton’s fiendishly cunning question masters, Ollie Fickling and Steve Woodcock. That will be followed by a special “make a movie” session for children in the Pavilion the following day, where the village children will get the chance to write, rehearse, perform, shoot and edit a film in one afternoon.

The evening will see the highlight of the two-day festival, with the showing of the grown-ups’ films at a gala evening in the pavilion and presentation of the Hornies!

If you’d like to find out more or just get a few tips, please ring organiser Pete Whitehead on 01295 670320. He’s got a host of suggestions, information and help on how to get started on that blockbuster!

18th January '05 - Lava Rock

World music aficionados will be beating a path to the door of Hornton Methodist Church at 7.30pm on Friday, January 28 to hear Lava. The band have a special band of World Music and play tangos, rumbas, blues, flamenco and jazz.

Julie Stanley, who is selling the tickets, says they are going really well but she’s still got some left, so call her now on 01295 670507 or email her at julieharrystan at aol dot com (replace the appropriate words with symbols - this is to stop spam)

On Friday, February 25, the classical guitar duo Divertimento will be playing at the same venue, so make a note in your diaries now!

18th January '05 - Chat Away

The Gossip, Hornton’s very own village newspaper, brings out its next edition in February and the deadline for contributions if January 31. So please contact Julie Stanley on 01295 670507 or julieharrystan at aol dot com (replace the appropriate words with symbols - this is to prevent spam) or Ann Hemmings on 01295 670511 with your recollections, recipes and reminiscences as soon as possible.

18th January '05 - Legs Eleven

The Dun Cow crib team didn’t play in the latest round of matches in the Harbury and District Crib League but earlier narrow defeats have now come back to haunt them. Every team has played 11 matches, which means they’re half way through the season, and the Hornton team are in six place in the 12-strong league, four points behind the Red Lion Inn from North End.

18th January '05 - New Year, New Leaf

The mobile library from Oxfordshire County Council will be on the village green next Wednesday from 10.55 to 11.30am.

18th January '05 - Church Services

There will be a service at 11am in the Methodist church this Sunday, January 23. At the same time, Holy Eucharist will be celebrated in the Parish Church of St John the Baptist. The Presence prayer group meets next Tuesday, January 25, in the Methodist School Room at 7.30pm Everyone is welcome.

14th January '04 - Souper Event

The generous folk of Hornton raised a fantastic £774 last Saturday for the victims of the Tsunami disaster at a special soup lunch in the Methodist Church.

There wasn’t a seat to be had, as customers could choose between three kinds of delicious home-made soup with crusty bread.

But it wasn’t just the nosh that raised the cash. The staff of Banbury silk flower company Pouliot Designs, where co-organiser Sarah Walther works, donated the fund they were going to use to go bowling to the cause. On top of that there was a raffle with no less than 36 prizes! All the prize winners are detailed on the village notice board.

“A big thank you must go out to all who came, donated wonderful prizesand to all who rolled up their sleeves and pitched in!” said co-organiser Lynne Miles.

14th January '04 - Gimme Shelter

£115 was raised just before Christmas when Hornton School held its carol concert. The money was sent to Shelter, the charity for the homeless.

Term 3 has just started and this year’s topics are Homes and Changes for Class 1. Class 2 will study Trees and Flowers and also Containers. Class 3’s topics are Fit and Healthy and What is it made of/how does it work?

Basketball starts for Class 3 today, Thursday, for five weeks. Classes 1 and 2 will be doing yoga with Ruth Griffiths during this time.

14th January '04 - Rocking All Over The World

Tangos, rumbas, blues, flamenco and jazz will all be on the bill when Lava play their special brand of World Music in Hornton Methodist Church at 7.30pm on Friday, January 28. Tickets won’t hang around for long, so ring Julie Stanley on 01295 670507 as soon as possible!

And on Friday, February 25, the classical guitar duo Divertimento will be playing the same venue, so make a musical note in your diaries for that concert too!

14th January '04 - Bringing Home The Bacon

It’s bacon sarnies and chips on the menu for a special…bacon-sarny-and-chips-butty-evening at the Dun Cow on Saturday week, January 22.

Just pop in from 7pm or, if you can, ring Gwyneth on 01295 670524 in advance to say you’re coming.

And real ale fans will be pouring into the pub in the first weekend of February, when the pub will be hosting the Second Hornton Winter Beer Festival. It will run from 7 to 11pm on Friday, February 4, 12noon to 11pm the following day and midday to 10.30pm on the Sunday. There will be at least six real ales to taste on tap, plus unusual bottled beers. Food will also be food available.

14th January '04 - Revenge is Sweet

The Dun Cow’s cribbage team got their own back on the Greaves Club from Bishop’s Itchington after losing to them in the Harbury and District Crib League. They beat them in the second round of the league’s cup and go forward to the semi-finals, to be played on February 22.

14th January '04 - Nothing Like a Good Gossip

But only if you contribute! The Gossip, Hornton’s very own village newspaper, brings out its next edition in February and the deadline for contributions if January 31. So please contact Julie Stanley on 01295 670507 or Ann Hemmings on 01295 670511 with your recollections, recipes and reminiscences as soon as possible.

14th January '04 - Church Services

Matins will be celebrated this Sunday, January 16, in the Parish Church of St John the Baptist at 10.30am. Half an hour later the Methodist Church will also hold a service.

The Thursday Club begins again today after school until 4.30pm in the Methodist School Room and Sunday School starts in the same place this Sunday between 9.45 and 10.45am.

10th January '05 - Some Memories from a childhood of the late forties and early/mid fifties in Hornton

No electricity; filling the paraffin lamps and lighting them. Going up the stairs to bed with a candle past the pork/bacon hanging on the stairs.

The arrival of electricity and the positioning of 3 or 4 street lights.

Pig in a sty and chickens in the garden; the squeal and blood when the pig had its throat cut. A football made from a Pigs bladder.

Coal being delivered by Freemans.

A weekly bath in front of the fire in the kitchen with water heated in a bucket on the Calor Gas stove.

The loo next to the pig sty. Upgrading from a Bucket to Elsan and burying the contents at intervals in the garden.

Tramps sometimes walking through the village and hiding in fear of them.

Beating carpets in the back yard.

Vague memory of my Grandmother , a small slight person who had 5 or 6 children, standing on her doorstep and in her house.

The same house was one of the first to be converted in the village and had a flush loo. A number of us children went there regularly after school a few years later to watch one of the first televisions in the village.

The smell of a chicken being de-gutted . A chicken was a luxury then.

Milk from the Andrews in Millers Lane making me sick. I have never drunk milk on its own since.

The Davies old dog lying outside their house in Millers Lane.

Small houses with families squashed into them.

Many children out playing in the summer evenings.

The end of rationing and Ration books.

Sunday lunch on piled high plates all cooked on a kitchen range taking its heat from the open fire and waiting for the Men to come home from the Pub.

A Privy at the end of a garden held up by Ivy which seemed to have been there for generations.

Seeing a severely lacerated arm following an accident at the Ironstone.

Sunday school with little square books. Who was the teacher?

Sunday school outings once a year to Whipsnade Zoo. Too frightened to go on the Water Shoot.

Birdsnesting. Wandering the fields in all directions. Keeping the blown eggs stored away from home in a hedge ( perhaps it was frowned on even then). Climbing high trees to get to nests.

Playing "catch" round the whole village on Summer evenings.

Haymaking in Sumner's field along Townsend and making Shucks.

Watching the rabbits run from corn at harvest time in Fox's fields.

Seeing the threshing machine in action at Crowes and playing in their Dutch Barn. Making tunnels, very dangerously, in the bales.

Picking potatoes in a field on the way to Horley. There was a reclusive man who lived up there who died following an explosion on the farm sometime later.

Fetes at Hornton Hall.

Sitting below the Lime trees on the village green making up nick names. Climbing them and seeing the thick trunks at the top after they had been lopped. Seeing a Frog blown up.

One day going for breakfast with a Man whose name I forget who lived in a Caravan at Abernethy's. A frying pan full of sizzling sausages.

The Phipps. The only really poor/disadvantaged children I can remember in the village.

Going up what seemed like a long dark tunnel to the Wheelers back kitchen in their house in Millers Lane to get apples from Lois Wheeler.

Being confirmed in Horley by the Bishop of somewhere ( ? Oxford).

On a Summer Sunday evening walking up Holloway to the New Inn and back again.

The Fire on "Bush" Hill which seemed to me at the time to be enormous. I was there and , for a while , trapped in the burning gorse.

The Coronation with hired Televisions in the Village Hall and a new Playground. The Slide being paid for by pennies collected by the School.

Bonfire Night with a Bonfire in the field at the bottom of Holloway. Walking around the village with torches and Bangers.

Sledging in the fields next to Holloway. Safe until the childrens playground was built . I remember a nasty accident when a girl (from the Archdale family I think) ran at full speed into the fence of the playground.

Taking Accumulators to the shop next to the Post Office to have them re-charged for the Radio.

Meat being delivered out of the back of Sumner's bus at Saturday lunchtime.

Saturday morning pictures in Banbury. Superman was the main attraction. The Mobile Shop coming once a week. One packet of Sweets (Rolo's) to last a week.

Football on Saturday afternoon in the field on the Horley road. The "garden "shed changing rooms in the corner of the field being replaced by a new bigger wooden building. Those big billowing blue shirts with white sleeves; Arthur Cleaver running up the wing with his sleeve buttons done up; the Hillmans with sleeves flapping around or rolled up in defence and Frank Jarrett in Goal with his big woolly Green roll neck jersey.

Listening on the Radio to Randolph Turpin from Leamington fighting for the World Middleweight Championship against Sugar Ray Robinson.

First day at school. Crying and being comforted by …………… ( would she remember) under the big wall of Brook's garden.

Miss Dimelows arrival to replace Miss Dawson. She drove a black car reg JG 8754 ( I think). Miss Dawson had fallen in love.

A little later a new headmaster for the school, Mr Levick who drove a car FUD 1.

Fred Eden , who ,I think, controlled the level crossing gates at the Ironstone, with his waxed moustache riding his bike to work and, when retired, sitting in his inglenook fireplace drinking a large Mug of black tea.

Bens ferrets for rabbiting.

Scrumping. Apples from the Prices and eating them in the churchyard and afterwards having a terrible stomach ache. Gooseberries from the Wheelers and being chased up Townsend but escaping.

Visits to the allotments.

Arnold Webb, the man from the Pru, in his suit, collecting what I now know to have been contributions for Life assurance policies.

School being just for arithmetic, reading and writing and playing with a bit of singing and religion thrown in.

Everyone knew each other, in some cases families had done so for generations.

Archie Andrews lollies and running the gauntlet of the Spikes dog ( Buster I think) to get them. I was frightened of that dog although in later life I have come to like and understand them.

Haircuts with Bill Freeman, visits to Dr. Rake, the Parkes in the Shop, Kate Turner in the Post Office and a myriad Others.