Dry Weather Reveals Didsbury Park’s Wartime History
TODAY - THE DRY WEATHER REVEALS DIDSBURY PARK'S WW2 HISTORY
As the hot dry weather continues and the normally large areas of green grass in the park turn various shades of white, we are treated to an historical map of the locations of the large World War Two underground bomb shelters in the park. These shelters were set up for the Didsbury community living in the nearby terraced houses along and off Gillbrook Road.
Picture 1 looks towards the roundabout in the park, where the descending path to the entrance started. The entrance, some 6ft+ below surface level can be seen in the picture where the small circular green patch is in the middle of the white grass line, about 30 metres from the roundabout. The entrance is located in the centre of the white strip of grass sloping upwards to the right of the picture. Interestingly this small patch of green grass sinks a few inches every year as the soil below pushes further into the underground entrance. So, every year, or so, one of our jobs is the re-lay turf over this dip in the ground to temporarily bring it all level again.
The tunnel shaped corrugated iron shelter walls were then buried several feet deep below the surface, protecting the inhabitants from bomb blasts, shrapnel aimed at the enemy aircraft overhead, before falling back to earth, and from any flying debris from bomb damage. There were usually rows of benches along each wall of the shelter for people to use to sit out the air raid and a small curtained off section for people to use as a toilet area. I am sure it was not very pleasant but at least, unless there was a direct hit, everyone was safe until the all clear sounded!
Picture 2 is taken facing the direction of the Buddy & Lucy carving. It shows 3 more parallel tunnels with a joining tunnel across the top nearest to us.
Please do check this out next time you are in the park!
TODAY
Once again, we had a lovely sunny morning for working in the park today. Despite a number of our regular volunteers being on holiday we still had a good turnout of 37 volunteers. We welcomed new volunteer Alex, awaiting his A-level results next week and about to start a gap year. Picture 3 shows Alex watering the Flower Walkhaving already watered the flower beds alongside the path to the Wilmslow Road entrance. Thank you Alex.
We also welcomed our youngest volunteer I can ever remember. Picture 4 shows new Mum, Emma, with baby Poppy about to start on an amazing litter pick right across the park. Thank you both. We were then joined by our regular young volunteer Millie, with her younger sister Issabelle and Mum Lauren and Dad Rob. Picture 5 shows Rob with Millie and a wheelbarrow full of watering cans as they set off to provide the flowers with a much needed drink. Thank you all.
We were also pleased to see Emma from Thales and Jude, back once again after a period of jury service. Everybody was made very welcome.
TODAY - THE FINISHING TOUCHES TO THE HARD STANDING OF THE NEW BENCH
Thank you to Steve and helpers Taylan, Chris and Shashvat who conveyed the newly delivered compact gravel in wheelbarrows to the site of the new bench installation and compacted it into place. Well done guys.
TODAY - TIME TO TIDY UP THE WILD FLOWER MEADOW - STEP ONE
Picture 6 shows the large team of volunteers under Kevin's guidance starting to remove the seed heads from this year's dominant oxide daises in the wild flower meadow. From left to right we have Lucy, Kevin, Louise, Felix, Taylan, Hermes and Emma from Thales on the far right doing the watering with the large hosepipe.
This was an amazing piece of work as it revealed many smaller wild flowers (including lots of poppies) which had been hidden away by the dominant large daises. This wild flower meadow experiment is really giving us lots of exciting surprises and learning. Thank you everyone - this was a great piece of work.
TODAY - THE EPICORMIC GROWTH TEAM
You may have noticed a huge improvement in the appearance of the large trees on the way to the children's playground. This is entirely due to our newly formed and dedicated team of Lorna and young Luke.
Picture 7 shows them posing for a picture, mid-work, on the large tree next to them. This dedicated team have worked on this project for the last 2 weeks continuously and the results are very impressive. Thank you both!
TODAY - OUR CRICKET GROUNDSMAN RETURNS TO A LOVELY SURPRISE
We were in for a very pleasant surprise today when Gary returned back from a couple of weeks away on holiday. What we found was that the cricket pitch had been so popular recently that it had actually been worn out. It has certainly been a great success to introduce this feature onto the sports field this year!!
Picture 8 shows Gary standing by the worn-out section but it also shows the great work Gary did this morning to create a new wicket alongside the worn out one. This was excellent work Gary. Thank you!
TODAY - OUR MANY HORTICULTURAL PROJECTS
Once again, our horticultural teams did some amazing work right across the park today:
Sonia and Anneworked on all the flower beds near Buddy and Lucy and they all looked stunning afterwards. Thank you both
Steve, Felix, Chris, Taylan and Shashvat started to prepare the old flower bed near the old gate into the wild flower meadow ready for a redesign and complete replanting. Despite this being really hard work in the hot conditions and dry hard soil, the team made a major start. Thank you all for such a heavy work.
Jude, Julie, Jane, Lucy and Christine all continued their dedicated relentless project of removing the ground elder and bind weed from the Flower Walk. This work is so important to our showpiece Flower Walk. Thank you all for your skill and dedication.
Picture 9 shows Denise with helpers Hermes, Alex and Elliott having tidied up the T bed opposite the rockery, being photographed as they reworked all the drainage channels bordering the path and grassed area. Thank you all - this looked so much better afterwards.
TODAY - ELSEWHERE IN THE PARK
It was great to see Brenda back in action today tidying the Gillbrook Road entrance area. Thank you Brenda - that was a huge trug full of tree needles you swept up!
After many years, out in all weathers, our lectern locks have become rusted up. Despite weeks of applying WD40 we had to use some force to unlock three of our standard locks today. Thank you to Allan for leading this rescue with Chris and Shashvat. We are now trying to soak the locks in oil to see if they can be repaired. Thank you Allan, Chris and Shashvat.
Thank you to Steve for pruning back our hedge of bamboo. It looks a bit more manageable now. Great job Steve.
Emma from Thales did a super sweeping job of the paths around the cafe. These looked incredibly clean afterwards. Thank you Emma.
Thank you also to Sonia, who stood in for Gill N today and managed our coffee time drinks order expertly. Thank you Sonia.
Once again Lesley concentrated on the flower bed next to the shelter and made a huge improvement. Thank you Lesley
We were very grateful for a donation of timber posts from Geoff early this morning - Thank you Geoff
CONGRATULATIONS - TRISTAN
It is always a great joy when any of our regular volunteers, who are looking for regular employment, are successful in securing a new position. Even though it often means that they cannot volunteer with us anymore, it is always a worthy case to celebrate!! I am delighted to let everybody know that Tristan has been able to secure a new appointment, which although initially is a volunteering role, it has the possibility of leading to a paid position later.
On behalf of myself and all your fellow volunteers Tristan, we wish you the very best of luck and success in you new role, and if ever you are free again on a Monday morning, there will always be a hi-vis waiting for you!
VANDALISM AND ANTI SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR ESCALATES AGAIN THIS WEEK IN DIDSBURY PARK
Finally, to end on a serious note. You may recall that last Monday the 'heavy gang' replaced the section of railing at the top end of the sports field which had been removed and left lying on the ground. On Tuesday I had a call to say that the section had been removed again overnight on Monday. When Tony from MCC and I inspected it on Tuesday morning we found that an angle grinder had been used to cut through the steel railing. This was a serious escalation. The fact that vandals were now bringing dangerous power tools into the park to destroy parts of the park is incredibly concerning.
Following discussion with the senior MCC parks team and the MCC Neighbourhood team I was requested to raise a police report. I did this on Tuesday and on Wednesday morning Darren, a local PCSO, attended the park and Tony from MCC returned with new bolts and chains to secure the railings in place once again. The police are now on the lookout for these vandals but need help in order to identify them. We are hundreds of pairs of eyes around Didsbury and especially around the park and we would dearly love to catch these people intent on destruction in the park.
If you have seen anything at all of these activities or know of anything that will help us to identify these people will you please let us know and we will pass it on to the police.
Thank you once again for your amazing support.