Newsletter
The committee continues to work hard to make full use of this wonderful redundant church for the benefit
of the local community and last year’s programme of cultural and heritage events was our most ambitious thus far. We are continuing to look for additional volunteers to help us with practical assistance
such as setting up the church for Flea Markets or helping to sell raffle tickets etc as without our willing helpers we would
find it difficult to put on so many events during the year.
The Churches Conservation Trust have recently confirmed that our church is their 9th most
visited church in the country and they consider it to be one of their most important buildings.
Last year's Special Events
We started in May with our Local History Exhibition featuring a living history display
by the Anglo-Saxons followed in June with a concert by the Great Sutton Male Voice Choir. In July
we held our second Art Exhibition with some 450 works of art on display. A new
venture for us, the ‘Festival of the Coast’, was a resounding success in August and in September
we took part in ‘National Heritage Open Days’ with displays and demonstrations of 17 different traditional rural
crafts. October saw us again taking part in ‘Big Draw Day’, a nationally organised event with
the purpose of encouraging people of all ages to take up drawing and painting. We finished the year with our Christmas Fair,
in November, with 35 stallholders filling the church and selling seasonal gifts.
Waterloo Flea Markets
The ever popular ‘Waterloo Flea Market’ continues to flourish and regularly now has about
80 stalls selling a wide variety of items and is open between 9.30am and 1pm on the first Saturday of every month. They run from February to May with a summer break and then start again in September. The income from the
Flea Markets together with grant monies has enabled the committee to run our summer programme with free entry to the public.
Farmers Markets
We are endeavouring to organise a Farmers Market on a regular monthly basis, possibly on a weekday,
rather than a weekend, and we would welcome the opinion of our members as to whether they would support such a venture as
we think such a facility is lacking in the area. Please let us have your views.
Other News
We were fortunate in 2008 in attracting a substantial grant from the National Lottery ‘Awards
for All’ scheme that has enabled us to purchase new furniture for the church and also to ensure that we are up to date
with fire precautions and health and safety issues.
The Churches Conservation Trust has recently replaced the high level lighting in the church and the
improvement is quite noticeable. They have also given us permission to install
infra-red heaters which now provide us with much needed and very welcome background heating. The bad news is that erosion
of some of the stonework to the tower is a cause for concern and is likely to be very expensive to rectify which will take
monies otherwise reserved for much needed improvements to facilities at the church.
The church is now much sought after as a venue for private parties and wedding receptions and we already
have four confirmed bookings for 2009 and even one for 2010. However, the committee are continually seeking ideas for fresh
activities to increase community use of the building and welcome suggestions from our members.
In the hope of attracting further visitor numbers we have recently joined the
‘North west multi faith tourism
association’ and have applied for their ‘Marque of Excellence’ award.
If you have not yet visited our web site then please do so at http://oldchristchurch.tripod.com.
The committee
Sadly we recently lost Joan Crichton who was a stalwart on the committee where she had served for many
years and she will be very much missed by all who knew her.
Fortunately we have been able to recruit three new committee members, John West, Elaine Rody and Karen
Salmon and we hope they will get as much satisfaction as the rest of the committee from helping to look after this architectural
masterpiece.
Finally our AGM is to be held in the church at 3pm on Friday 8th May and you are most welcome to attend
John
Bramham
Chairman
