Now in their ninth year, the Retford branch of the U3A now has a membership of over 500 people. There are around 50 interest groups and new members often join the U3A specifically to join just one group. There is a full General U3A meeting, held once a month, at the Well Baptist Church, Retford, on the fourth Thursday of the month.
At the General Meeting on 27th September the guest speaker was Mike Storr, whose talk, ‘Masters of Mirth,’ covered the history of British Music Halls, and some of the great comedians who walked the famous boards.
The group’s speaker finder, Dave Lee, has excelled himself once again for the October General Meeting. Vince Eager came to fame in the ‘Skiffle Band’ era of the 1950s. He worked in television as a regular on BBC’s ‘Drumbeat’. Moving to the United States, Vince worked as a cruise director on American luxury cruise ships. Returning to England, Vince is still working, appearing on the 2018 Billy Fury album, ‘The Symphonic Sound of Fury’.
The two highlighted interest groups this month are the Local and Military History groups.
The Local History group meet at Westhill Community Centre, every second Tuesday of the month. Their speakers for October and November are Chris Weir, who will tell the group in October of ‘Nottinghamshire’s Dark Side’, and the November speaker is Maureen Taylor, who will discuss ‘Garderobes, Grime and Leeches’.
The Military History group is, like the Local History group, very popular. The group has ten meetings a year and two UK day trips as well as a four-or five-day trip to Europe each spring. The meetings take place at Hallcroft Community Centre on the second Thursday of the month, and start at 10.00am prompt. The October speaker, Steve Short, is going to talk about a member of the magic circle, who worked on the design of decoy aircraft and tanks during the Second World War and in November, Andy Smart will be talking about those Twentieth Century War Heroes, who came from Nottinghamshire.
It has now been announced that both the chairman and secretary of Retford U3A will be resigning from the committee, at the next AGM. As the group needs both posts filled to remain in existence, can you start thinking about possible nominees for both positions? If you are interested in either, contact chairman Chris Clifford (his contact email address is on the U3A website, under Committee).
The ethos of the U3A, which stands for The University of the Third Age, is that members keep themselves active in body and mind, learning from each other, with shared experiences. If you want to know more about the Retford U3A, have a look at their comprehensive web site, or contact the Membership Secretary, Paul Bacon at membership@retford-u3a.org.uk for more details.