Hi everyone
Spring is a time of renewal and rebirth. So far 2025 has seen me move into a new house into which we are settling nicely, still a long way to go to get it as I would like. I have found though that my Tetris stacking skills are getting better and am trying to use every available space for storage and displaying my favourite things. I am pleased to say that I have purchased new book cases for my collection of Wiltshire related books and of course my own small collection of Agatha Christie, Tim Weaver, Ian Rankin, Peter May and Richard Osman crime fiction. I do love a good mystery – now you know why I love this website and family history. The mystery of the search and solving the path of clues is somewhat relative don’t you all think.
Anyway back to regrowth and Spring. In January when we arrived here there was a very bare, dead looking tree trunk sat towards the end of my garden which we thought was ready to be chopped down for firewood. The tree surgeons had been in and removed a lot of what was apparently over hanging branches and the tree had no signs of life. Then one morning as I was hanging out some washing I noticed a few tiny leaf buds and realised it was alive. Now it is full of new growth and it is attracting birds who sing so loudly but lovely. Nature at its most wondrous. I have also seen a fox and we think we have a hedgehog pathway at the very bottom where there is a patch of brambles. I am not getting rid of these I will cut them back and hopefully will get some fruit from them in the Autumn, I do love a nice blackberry and apple pie or crumble with custard. The garden will get more attention as the year progresses but for now its just a tidy up and get to know what’s there. I have no idea what specie of tree I have been left with must try and find out. Most of the garden is covered in grass but along with a carpet of dandelions I have found a primrose and what I believe is a small patch of celandine, its been a long time since I have had a garden so my plant recognition is limited.
News of the OPC website. It too has had Spring changes. A few weeks back our Webmaster Richard Cresswell announced he would be standing down his post as webmaster and host at the end of March 2026. We thought we would start looking for someone to take over. It did not take long for Ben Grist to step up and offer to take over. It was decided not to wait for Richard’s end date for his services in 2026 and the site has now been moved over. Of course we must be eternally grateful to Richard as when the original host/owner of the website gave up the post due to ill health some years ago now Richard came to the rescue. It was a learning curve for me as I became Co-ordinator of the project but with support from Richard and our trusted team of OPC’s and transcribers we continued to build and grow, So please everyone wish Richard a very happy and long retirement and we hope he is successful in whatever he does in the future. I must add that Richard was really patient with me over his time as Webmaster and I learned a lot from him. Good luck Richard and thank you for saving us as a research facility when you did and I hope you keep in touch.
So let us welcome Ben Grist who has taken over the role of webmaster and host. Am already learning new things – I had no idea for example that the cost of hosting a website is dependent partly on the traffic it generates. The more successful and the more hits the site receives, if I got it right, then the more it costs to host the site and maintain it. More about that later.
Ben am sure will help guide me as to what is possible with the growth and development of the site. Like Richard, I hope he will tell me if we are being too ambitious and that an idea is a good or bad one. I am not going to bombard him with ideas yet but am sure some will head his way later on. We also look forward to Ben’s ideas of how to develop the site and build on its capabilities and potential.
As I suggested, maintaining the site does cost money and although we have a healthy pot of funding available to us it won’t last for ever. We intend on keeping access to the site free to use by anyone who wishes to join or visit us. What we do ask is that if you find the website useful you would consider making a small donation if you can to help us keep it free and online, each donation extends the longevity of the website.
The people who run and maintain the website are not paid or reimbursed for anything they contribute, whether its their time or items they may purchase such as reference books, old postcards and other items that they use to transcribe and research from. Some examples are membership of sites such as Ancestry, Find My Past, Forces War records and other subscription based sites. Occasionally to back up some research we may purchase a birth, marriage or death certificate. John Pope travels to Wilshire twice and maybe three times a year from his home in East Anglia, he stays in b and bs at his own expense whilst he visits churches and places of interest photographing as much as he can, he then spends a lot of time processing the information into word documents and photo galleries which he then publishes on the website. Then there are things like Microsoft and Adobe that we use to create word documents, spreadsheets and pdfs. Of course we use electricity to power our devices, we purchase devices, we use fuel or pay for train or bus tickets to visit places and repositories. Obviously not every penny is spent on things I mention here by our volunteers, but a proportion of those things are used to keep the website online, maintained and developed. None of the volunteers are paid or re-imbursed for anything.
You can help us keep it going, you can help in several ways.
- Join us as an OPC and help us build on the information available – to volunteer go to the website or Facebook page and contact – Teresa Lewis on the website contact list or Teresa Sheridan in the Facebook group
- Donate items of interest such as books, postcards, photographs etc. Eventually these will be handed on to other co-ordinators of the website or to repositories such as the Wiltshire Archives, Village Historical groups or the Wiltshire Family History Society. If you would like to gift a book, letters, photographs or postcards or anything of Wiltshire interest then please contact the Co-Ordinator (Teresa Lewis) via the website contact us tab.
- Consider making a small financial donation or leave a gift in your will. Donations can be made via our Just Giving Page.
The website will remain free to use for the foreseeable future. Its not my site it belongs to us all
