Sampford Arundel WI members recently went on a trip to Bickham House which is part of the National Garden Scheme, and had a really enjoyable day. It is a large well maintained garden by Juliet and her small band of gardeners. After walking around the garden we were treated to some lovely refreshments of tea and homemade cake. Hopefully we will go for another visit in the spring.

The Sampford Arundel Flower Show and Fete was held on July 12 and the extremely hot weather didn't deter our members from hosting the cake stall and entering lots of the cookery, craft, flower and vegetable classes, which resulted in four of our members winning trophies.

Our speaker Debbie Wood, a retired police officer gave a very entertaining talk entitled 'why is his truncheon bigger than mine'. A couple of incidents when Debbie was very young led her to wanting to become a police officer but the problem was that Debbie didn't pass the five exams required to enter police college. Luckily her Headmaster encouraged her to join the youth training scheme and helped her to pass the exams. After passing her training Debbie was posted to Brighton where she was the only police woman with 38 male colleagues. All through Debbie's 30 years of service she fought for equality for women and recommended lots of changes to support this.

Our social time this month was an A to Z quiz where members were given a list of topics and a starting letter and had to try and match their answers, a point was given for each correct match.

The competition letter this month was either J or U and the winning entry was an underground ticket, closely followed by some jewellery.

Sampford Arundel WI's next meeting will be on September 9, 7.30pm at The Beambridge Inn and we welcome new members and visitors. Contact Heather 666439 if you would like to find out more about our WI.

This year’s Flower & Produce Show attracted over 250 exhibits across its five classes of cut flowers, floral art and pot plants, fruit and vegetables, handicrafts, and children’s. All entries were of the highest standard and warmly praised by the judges; particularly pleasing was the number and quality of the entries in the children’s classes.

Well done to all exhibitors, to those who were awarded placements, and to the following for winning the cups and trophies:

Mayson Taylor-Jones awarded the Harper Cup : open to SA Primary School children, who this year were asked to grow a potato in a bucket; Mayson’s potatoes weighed in at 1.8kilos (4lbs 2oz)

Charlie Carter - the Mary Rowland Cup : Children’s classes, most outstanding exhibit of “A day at the seaside”

Kit Pollard - the Junior Challenge Shield : Children’s classes, most points scored

Jane Dickins – Valerie Milton Bowl : SA Gardening Club members only; members were tasked with growing a Dahlia from seed

Philip Popplestone – SA Gardening Club Perpetual Cup : most outstanding Fruit & Vegetable exhibit

Ruby Bray – Floral Art Cup : most outstanding Floral Art exhibit

Susan Bellringer – Tony Spiller Cup : most outstanding Flower classes exhibit

Heather Cook – Women’s Institute Shield : most points scored in Cookery & Handicraft classes

Nick Matthews – Silver Jubilee Championship Cup : most points scored in Flower, Fruit & Vegetable classes.

We are grateful to our judges – Sheena and Stephen Page, Lesley Retallack and Sandy Lister – for their considered assessment of the entries.

One of the fun highlights at Sampford Arundel village fete held on Saturday, July 13, was to witness the local MP Gideon Amos being pelted with wet sponges hurled at him by enthusiastic children. The MP cheerily agreed to face the ordeal of ‘the wet sponges’ and the children obviously loved it. Our trusty MP emerged from his ordeal smiling and totally drenched from head to foot to the applause and shouts of ‘Well done’ from everyone.

The fete was opened by Wellington’s town crier Andrew Norris, resplendent in his scarlet outfit, tricorn hat and big brass bell.

In traditional manner his loud cries of ‘Oh Yez, Oh Yez ‘gained everyones attention to proclaim the fete open and to announce the various stalls and attractions.

Andrew reminded everyone that once again Sampford had upheld the tradition of staging a fantastic village fete with all the old favourites one expects, such as, tombola, bottle stall, crockery smash which the kids absolutely loved and the coconut shie and skittles always firm favourites with the ‘grown ups.’

The ‘Water or Wine’ lucky dip stall always great fun, did a roaring trade and Sampford Gardening Club once again had a great selection of plants for sale. The W.I. cake stall was soon sold out.

This year it was good to see local children taking an active part on various stalls.

The ‘Wellington Ukes’ ukulele band provided a delightful musical backdrop for the afternoon which

for many people is meeting up with old friends and to enjoy a chat over a cream tea. The ladies of from FOSAS ( friends of Sampford Arundel school) who ran the tea tent did an amazing job in the heat and were kept busy all afternoon.

‘Once again, a thoroughly rewarding and enjoyable afternoon, albeit an extremely hot one and

together with the flower show, evening bingo and Songs of Praise on the Sunday, a sum of almost £2,500 was raised for village organisations. Thank you to everyone.

Next year Sampford Fete will celebrate it’s centenary year, so we’re aiming for something a bit special!’ Said fete committee chairman John Troake.

The Friends of The Museum of Somerset (FOTMOS) were pleased to welcome to their July meeting Richard Kay, who has been an auction house picture specialist since 1987. He began his career at Sotheby’s after university (where he read Art History), and worked at Lawrence’s Auctioneers in Crewkerne for 25 years. His talk was entitled Trick or Treat – Fakes and Forgeries in the Art Market.

Initially the audience admired a photo of an etching by Rembrandt which had first come to auction in 1960, and had been drawn on paper made by Rembrandt himself. Richard then continued his talk by showing photos of various pieces of art, some genuine and others fake, and challenged the audience to identify which was which. He gave the example of a Botticelli painting (Madonna of the Veil) bought by Lord Leigh of Fareham which he had donated to The Courtauld Gallery. The then Director of the National Gallery subsequently suggested that it had ‘something of the silent cinema star about it’ - maybe Jean Harlow.

After the Second World War, conservation treatment was carried out on this painting, and it was discovered that the robe of the Madonna had been painted using Prussian blue – a pigment that only came into use in the early 18th Century, and the grains of pigment had been very finely ground – characteristic of machine-ground commercial pigments. This painting is now accepted as the work of the forger Umberto Giunti.

Often more can be learned from the back of a painting than from the front. Supposed wormholes in the wood, on examination, will turn out to have been drilled (stress fractures in the paint around the holes prove this). A painting alleged to have been created by Rembrandt using flowers cut out from one of his actual works was identified as a fake on close inspection due to no fresh brush strokes being identified. An imitation of Augustus John’s work was revealed as the style was very much ‘overdone’, similarly a work alleged to be by Andy Warhol was just simply ‘over-egged’! And a forger of ‘Vermeer’ paintings simply produced too many.

Richard concluded his talk by admitting that the first picture he had shown to the audience (the etching by Rembrandt) had been a forgery – how easy it is to fool people!

The next meeting of FOTMOS will be on Tuesday, August 19, at 7.30pm, when Mary Siraut will give a talk on Booze, Blood & Baskets: Electing Taunton’s MPs. Guests are always welcome; for details, please email [email protected]

After the joyous village celebrations for the 80th anniversary of VEDay80 at Hemyock, the VJDay80 commemorations will be a quieter event which is hoped will be attended by many.

A special service , to which all are warmly welcomed, will be held at the parish church of St Mary’s on Sunday, August 10 at 11am to remember and give thanks for the end of the second world war and for the so named ‘Forgotten Army’ who had continued fighting in the Far East following VE Day.

On Friday, August 15, VJDay80, the church will be serving light refreshments between 11am and 4pm where there will also be a display. People are invited to join a short commemorative time led by Rev John Stone at the War Memorial when at 12pm, and as part of the national event, a two minute silence will be held, a wreath laid and the Royal British Legion Lantern of Peace will be lit.