Oakridge WI: Fiona Warren's talk on The Land Girls and a talk by the National Trust at Newark Park

THE Open Meeting held on April 14, was a huge success, we were delighted to welcome Fiona Warren once more, this time her talk was on Land Girls.

Fiona began by giving a brief but instructive history of the Land Girls formation in May 1942.

Fiona then handed out some name tags, and invited those ladies to join the Land Army.

The various groups were as follows:

Agriculture - planting potatoes, sugar beet etc, this also included hedging and ditching.

Forage Department - looking after horses

Timber - later known as Lumber Jills, this included cutting timber for pit props.

The best ladies were reserved for The Pest Control Department.

These ladies were given a bicycle with a tin strapped onto it to hold the arsenic.

The wages were a princely sum, paid by the farmer of 22/6d per week!

We would highly recommend this talk to other WIs.

May 12, Resolutions meeting.

Both resolutions were well discussed and instructions were given to our delegate on which way we voted, when she represents us at the AGM.

Then Brian from the National Trust at Newark Park showed us some lovely slides of this fascinating property which was originally a Hunting Lodge.

The gardens and lake looked lovely, and we are eagerly awaiting our planned visit to see it all for ourselves on August 11.

Dates for your Diary - June 9, Members Meeting.

July 14 - William Reddaway with his talk entitled 'Ride around England'.