Abingdon County Hall Museum have their last Dinasaur Stomp this coming Wednesday, exploring the land that time forgot. This is part of the activities put on by the museum for the summer holidays.

Then a week after going back to school, Abingdon is turning Medieval on September 10th as part of Heritage Open Days. The 1st Stone of Abingdon Bridge was laid 600 years ago and the festival are celebrating the anniversary. There are leaflets in the museum to tell you all that is happening. There is also the Abingdon Heritage website and the national Heritage Day Site – where you can search Abingdon among other national treasures.

There is not just the medieval festival, but also lots more:

• Fifteen properties in Abingdon open for free
• An exhibition of Abingdon in the 1950s (the week before to remember the Queen’s visit)
• Tours of Culham Science Centre / JET (book in advance by 8th September)
• A talk by Jackie Smith about the history of Abingdon Bridge (on 8th September)
• Walks
• A bell ringing demonstration (part of over 500 bell ringing events during Heritage Open Days nationally).

Under the archway connecting Stert Street and the Market Place is a mural painted by Margaret Jones, the same artist who painted, and repainted, the mural in the Stratton Way underpass. It shows three stone landmarks from Abingdon, and was commissioned by the Friends of Abingdon on the wall of John Menzies shop in 1991.

The Queen Victoria statue was given to the town by E.J Trendell, and was to be seen on the Market Place for about 60 years, and has been in the Abbey Grounds for the next 70 years.

There is Abingdon’s “Right, Goodly Crosse of Stone” built in 1441, and demolished by parliamentary soldiers during the English Civil War in 1644.

There is also an Obelisk Lamp Standard (1834-1887) that was part of the first gas street lighting system in Abingdon. I believe this one was to be seen alongside the River Thames near Abingdon Bridge.

Last week, one news story from Abingdon got promulgated around the world. It concerned the 1936 Annual from Our Lady’s School in Abingdon. A clue found by an American scholar led to a search in the school archives for THE “ANNUAL”, where two forgotten poems by J.R.R Tolkein were discovered.

The poems included the Shadow Man and a festive poem ‘Noel’. Tolkein, a Roman Catholic, was professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, when he formed the friendship with the Abingdon school.

A school exhibition is planned where the poems will be displayed alongside other interesting artifacts.

Everybody living in Abingdon will recognise the chimney above the Old Abbey buildings. But do you know where these other chimneys are to be found?

1. Something and mortar up this narrow street

2. Extended for skittles

3. Charlie’s lost crown, and gong

4. Antique stopping place with just three feet

5. Confused Breath Test

6. Three is one and one is three