Contacts

The Teddington Society
21 Teddington Park
Teddington TW11 8DB

Contact by e-mail:
secretary@teddingtonsociety.org.uk

The Christmas 2009 issue of Tidings includes the following:

• Letter from the Chair
• From the Editor
• Reports from the Groups
• The Thames at Teddington
• Pip Temlett - 100
• Ward names
• Parking at Teddington Hospital
• Pheasantry Welcome Centre
• Jeremy Thorpe
• Richmond In Bloom Awards
• Stephen Hales
• 150th Anniversary of the Teddington Methodist Church
• Business Exchange
• Diary and Events

Letter from the Chair
I write this in the midst of a most beautiful autumn. After our rather wet and dismal summer season, September and now October have produced not mists but sunshine and mellow fruitfulness. The leaves are turning to lovely shades of yellow and red and I have had an astonishing harvest of plums, apples and now quinces. Folklore would have it that this means we shall have a hard winter but we shall see.

By the time you read this winter, will be upon us with the annual Teddington events of the Merit's lunch, the turning on of the Christmas lights with attendant festivities, and the Teddington Society Party in January. Meantime may I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year.

Jenny Hilton

From the Editor
Another year nearly over. We have all been affected in some way by the financial crises that have rocked the world over the last 12 months or so but life goes on and it is good to see that our Society continues to thrive. Perhaps these global problems only serve to bring home to us the necessity to forge and maintain strong local communities – that we cannot live in isolation and that a community spirit is needed to weather these storms.

And on that note, a reminder of our New Year party in January – a chance to renew all those old acquaintances that we have all been meaning to get round to – and maybe make some new friends.

You will recall that, in our last issue, we drew to a close our series of articles on the Lords of the Manor in Teddington. This time we see the start of a new series on the Thames at Teddington. I know that Dick and Gilly Hughes have put a considerable amount of effort and research into this subject and I am sure that you will not be disappointed by the results.

If I don’t see you before then, I wish you all a very Happy Xmas

Mike Woods

Stephen Hales On August 22nd traffic stopped in Ferry Road as Andrew Williams from All Hallows, Twickenham led a procession across the road into St Mary's Parish Church for a service of evening prayer to commemorate Stephen Hales. Dr David Allan of the William Shipley Society was accompanied by John Demont representing the Teddington Society, Julia Scaping of the Borough of Twickenham Local History Society and Colin McCrossan of the Richmond USA Group. David Allan gave the address commemorating the tercentenary of Stephen Hales coming to Teddington as perpetual curate, a post he held from 1709 for 50 years and a post which increased his salary from £9 to £90 a year. Some quotes from Gilbert White (1720-93), clergyman and botanist, were fascinating:

• Hales peered inside ladies' kettles to see how encrusted with limescale they were;
• he tested wells for dangerous odours;
• he directed that air-holes be left in "out walls of ground rooms to prevent rotting of floor & joists";
• he gave advice to watermen on "how they might best preserve & keep sound the bottom of their boats";
• he taught housewives to put an inverted teacup in a pie to prevent the syrup from boiling over;
• Hales painted fences white so that people wouldn't fall against them in the dark!

Dr Johnson, whose tercentenary is also this year, in his famous Dictionary listed the meaning of Ventilation simply as: "being invented by Dr Hales".

White said of Hales: "Though a man of a baronet's family, and of one of the best houses in Kent, yet was his humility so prevalent, that he did not disdain the lowest offices, provided they tended to the good of his fellow creatures". Praise indeed for a remarkable man. One of Teddington's finest.