Monthly Archives: July 2010

Yeah Baby! 2

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Play Bus
The Play Bus had to make a couple of circuits of the town centre before it got the correct angle to turn successfully onto the Market Place.
Our Friends Electric
This is the second time that the Yeah Baby Free Rock Festival has happened in the centre of Abingdon. Thy are raising money for the John Radcliffe Children’s Hospital and Ronald McDonald House.The group in the picture are called “Our Friends Electric”. They performed music from the 1980s round about lunchtime.
Pylon High
My wife came back at about 4 and said she had just seen Madness – or a band very like them – playing on the Market Place. So I dashed out, but it was too late…

Instead the crowds were just milling about, and I took this picture of face painting instead. I did see Madness once. They were part of the 2-Tone tour in 1979. The concert included them, The Specials, and The Selector. It cost £2 and was well worth it.

John Mason School’s 5 Decades

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O6 Art Exhibition
50th anniversary celebrations have been going on at John Mason Secondary School.  They had a Fun Day last Saturday and an assembly to celebrate the anniversary mid week.

Yesterday,  I went to the school’s O6 Art Gallery where, beyond the A Level Course work exhibition, there was a 50th anniversary exhibition…John Mason 70s and 80s

Last Saturday at the Fun Day a lot of the pupils dressed up.  Years 7s in 1970s,  year 8s in 80s, year 9 in 90s, and other years in 60s gear.  But as I was not there to see them, here is the real thing, thanks to Friend Reunited…John Mason in 1968
A sixth form group from the late 60s.
John Mason in 1972
An early 70s school group.
John Mason in 1986
A group that went on a school trip in the 198os.
John Mason in 1998
A year group in the late 1990s or 2000s.

Pylon High

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Pylon High
This stretch of road is between Drayton and Steventon,  two  miles south of Abingdon.

Over to the left is the site of the proposed reservoir – currently the subject of a public enquiry which will judge whether Thames Water have justified the need. The enquiry room is surrounded by towering shelves of documents both for and against the reservoir. Every now and then the clerk will go to a particular folder, find a specific piece of evidence, and present it to the hearing.
Pylon High
The large poster attached to the electricity pylon on the edge of the flat farmland says, “Dam Wall. Pylon High! 25 Metres“.

Pylon High
The reservoir would be constructed by hollowing out a basin and building up surrounding walls.

Pevsner’s 2010 study of Berkshire

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There is a well thumbed copy of Pevsner’s 1966 study of Berkshire architecture in the local studies reference section of Abingdon library. There are 11 pages about Abingdon. Pevsner has a controversial turn of phrase…

1. St Nicholas – An odd west front
2. Trinity – full-blown churchy…fussy Geometrical tracery
3. County Hall – Of the free-standing town halls of England this is the grandest – grander decidedly that Windsor
4. Old Police Station – A plain, honest job

Free Library
5. Free Library – too tall to be credible or suitable within the scale of Abingdon

6. Abingdon School – high, clumsy and Gothic
7. Old Gaol – impressive enough by itself; the siting is unpardonable.
8. Corn Exchange – no definite style nor alas personality
9. Abingdon Bridge – the view towards St Helens church is lovely, or would be, if it were not for the Old Gaol
10. Queens Hotel – unbelievably joyless

(The Corn Market and Queens Hotel got demolished soon after – unable to carry on after Pevsner.)
Pevsner Pilgrims

In 2010 a fully revised and rewritten Pevsner’s Berkshire has been published.

Abingdon is still in Berkshire, not Oxfordshire according to this book. (Abingdon was transferred to Oxfordshire 8 years after Pevsner but many still keep the faith and will be glad of this keeping with tradition.)

There was a walk round some of our great Abingdon buildings yesterday organised by Mostly Books- taken by the author of the new Pevsner. The new book looks much bigger than the original. It is better researched. A few of Pevsner’s more whimsical judgements have been removed, but most are still in. The new author recognises their charm.