Celebrating 12 years of the blog!

So, a couple of days ago saw the 12th anniversary of the beginning of this blog! In previous years, I’ve invited people to write a post related to some of Loughborough’s history, to be hosted on the blog, but this year I thought I’d write a series of posts myself, a couple before the actual anniversary day, and a couple afterwards. However, I’ve missed both the before and the on the day opportunity, and I’m only here today because I couldn’t let the occasion go by without some kind of post!

I am rather staggered that the viewing figures for the blog are now nearing one million! It had never occurred to me that my ramblings about our lovely town would ever have much longevity, and the idea that the blog has been read so many times is, well as I said, simply staggering. As I write this post, views are 988,086, and this year (August 2024 - August 2025) alone there have been over 270,000 views!

The past year has flown by, too, and I have been kept busy, not only with the blog, but with lots of volunteering activities, attending heritage events and meetings, giving presentations, and leading guided walks. Oh, and a new book coming out in late September!

I have a bit of a penchant for sharing stories of people, some well-known, others less so, but I see this year I’ve reined that in a bit and kept it down to five posts [1]! Unless you count the others, like Robert Bakewell anniversary post [2]; a couple of posts about the Coltman family and Burleigh Hall [3], and three posts about Shelthorpe House and the people who used to live there [4].

With the 100th anniversary of the exhibition in Paris that led to the naming of the Art Deco movement and the April A-Z blogging challenge coming along at the same time, I wrote 26 posts related to Art Deco, which took up almost the whole of April! A full list of these articles was posted around the beginning of May. [5]

In September 2024 I presented quite a number of posts related to the Heritage Open Days events which were taking place as part of Loughborough’s contribution to this programme. Many heritage-related places took part and were open during the final weekend of the Open Days, and overall lots of visitors came and enjoyed their visit.

The Hope Bell and the beacon in Queen's Park

I try very hard to keep up with what’s going on in our town, but have really struggled this year! I presented the customary review of buildings that had been demolished, or disappeared during the previous calendar year [6], and managed to cover things like the installation of the Hope Bell (although I was away for the opening ceremony) [7], the re-dedication of the gates of the parish church [8], the parish church Christmas Tree Festival [9], an exhibition of research into Nanpantan [10], and a celebration of 120 years of our beautiful public library [11].

Other than to keep on blogging, I have no firm plans for the blog into its thirteenth year, but I know I still have a few series to finish for you, which includes Goadby’s History of Loughborough, a whole load of Agatha Christie connections to Loughborough, and maybe some connections I discovered on a recent trip to London.

In the meantime, you might spot me out and about leading guided walks, especially during this year’s Heritage Open Days, when I will be extending beyond the weekend of 20-21 September, and walking beyond the confines of the town centre streets!

Thank you for reading the blog!    

 

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NOTES

[1] A.E. King pt 1, and A.E. King pt 2; 

Thomas Barker; William Thomas Cartwright; John Thomas Judges

[2] Robert Bakewell 

[3] Coltmans and Burleigh Hall pt 1, and pt 2

[4] Shelthorpe House the early years; the middle years, and the final years

[5] The full list of Art Deco A-Z posts

[6] Changes pt 1, and Changes pt 2, and Ones to Watch out for in 2025!

[7] Hope Bell installation

[8] Re-dedication of the parish church gates

[9] Christmas Tree Festival

[10] Nanpantan exhibition

[11] 120 years of the public library

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2025). Celebrating 12 years of the blog! Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2025/08/celebrating-12-years-of-blog.html  [Accessed 6 August 2025]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

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Carillon recitals

There’s been lots happening in Loughborough lately, but sadly, I seem to have missed quite a lot of it!

So, although I was invited to the ceremony to hear the first sounding of the Hope Bell, I wasn’t able to attend. Of course, I’ve been taking photos for a while now, so I’ve probably got enough over a period of time to write a decent account of the bell from start to finish.

I almost missed the demolition of the Herbert Morris factory on Empress Road, but just managed to catch the tail end of it. Again, I’ve taken plenty of photos over the past couple of years, so I’ll post them in a blog sometime.

What else did I miss? Oh yes, the opening of the new exhibition at the Old Rectory, which showcases the work done by the Loughborough Archaeological and Historical Society, and in particular Brian Williams, in uncovering the building which you see today, trying to understand it, and trying to present it to the public. Oh, and I missed the art exhibition down at the parish church, when, amongst other things, they had a VR flythrough high up in the ceiling! And I missed the Old Rectory Community Day!

As if that weren’t enough, although I heard the Carillon playing yesterday, and I knew it was Saturday, it wasn’t until this morning that I realised yesterday was the anniversary of the opening of the Carillon – in 1923! It’s always lovely to hear the Carillon being played – and played so well!!

I must admit, sadly I didn’t linger long enough to take in what the carillonneur was playing, but I have recently come across the programme for a recital, which was performed by Eric Jordan (I’ve previously written about him on this blog), on Saturday April 12th, 1924, at 5.30 in the afternoon.

The programme was billed as being “Toll for the brave that are no more.” and included

1. Softly awakes my heart, by Saint Saens

2. i. Smilin’ through, by A. W. Penn and ii. Love sends a little gift roses, by Openshaw

3. Andante, by Couperin

4. March van Hartopp, by Degruytter (18th century)

5. Le cygnet (The Swan), by Saint Saens

6. Tempo di Gavotta, by Fesch

7. i. Come back to Erin, ii. Blue bells of Scotland, and iii. Drink to me only with thine eye

8. Berceuse de Jocelyn, by Godard

9. Song without words no.9, by Mendelssohn

Such a worthy concert could not be concluded without a rendition of God Save The King.

Interestingly, there were to be recitals throughout the Easter period, which were given by M. Robert Dierick, who was the Carillonneur in the city of Ghent, in Belgium.   

 

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2025). [Post title]. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2025/07/carillon-recitals.html  [Accessed 27 July 2025]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

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NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

Seeing the Old Rectory in a new light

I recently stopped off down at the Old Rectory and had a good look round. I’ve talked about this in a previous post, but here’s what I saw this time:

 

 

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2025). Seeing the Old Rectory in a new light. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2025/07/seeing-old-rectory-in-new-light.html [Accessed 23 July 2025]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

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Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne

So Who Was John Thomas Judges

Last week on the blog we celebrated 120 years since the opening of the Carnegie Library on Granby Street. In the report of the opening ceremony, there was mention of several people with a connection to the town, and to the library, so I thought this week I would tell you a little about one of those people - John Thomas Judges.

Posted with kind permission of LCC, granted Sept 2024

John Thomas Judges was born in 1848, and baptised at Boughton-under-Blean in Kent, on 14 January 1849. His parents were John, a bricklayer, born at Boughton-under-Blean, near Faversham in Kent, and Mary (née Fox), born at Harbledown, near Canterbury, but only about 5 miles from Boughton-under-Blean. The couple had already had three other children before John Thomas was born – William baptised on 22 August 1841, Catherine (sometimes recorded as Caroline) baptised 5 March 1843, and Rachel Mary born c.1847. At least two further children followed, in 1851 and 1852, but sadly, both died in infancy.

John Thomas attended the District National School and Wreight’s School, both in Faversham, and later became a pupil teacher in the local schools. In 1870 he qualified as a teacher, and became head teacher at the River Board School, in Kearsney, Kent, which when it was first established was in a small wooden building near the railway station. On 20 September 1873, John Thomas married Caroline Eleanor Swoffer of Faversham, at the church of St Peter and St Paul in Boughton-under-Blean, and sometime after their marriage the couple made their home in Quorn, where daughter Kate Swoffer Judges was baptised on 17 August 1876, and Caroline Mary Swoffer was baptised at All Saints church in Loughborough on 22 July 1879, after her father had taken up the head teacher post at the Lancastrian School on Church Gate.

From 1880 onwards, John Thomas was listed in various directories as being the school master at the Burton Endowed School situated at 43 ½ Church Gate. John’s parents were still living in Boughton-under-Blean, which is where his mother died in 1884. 

In December 1886, at a meeting to discuss the formation of a cricket club, John was elected to the committee, along with, amongst others, John Paget, Alfred Adolphus Bumpus. In 1891, John, still listed on the census return as a certified teacher, and Caroline, now aged 42 and 40, were living at 43b Church Gate with daughters Kate aged 14, and Caroline aged 12, who were both attending school. However, a trade directory of 1895 lists John as an insurance agent on Church Gate, although he continued to teach at the school until 1909.

On 4 October 1899, John, a retired builder, who was the father of John Thomas, died in Boughton-under-Blean. John Thomas and Caroline were still living on Church Gate in 1901, but Caroline was at the Training College for Mistresses at Cheltenham, and Kate was possibly in St Andrews, training to be a teacher, although by 1904 she was an Assistant Mistress at the Wallingford Grammar School. Sadly, in June 1905, Caroline Judges died, and following a period of failing health, John Thomas also died on 28 September 1909. Probate was granted on 12 January 1910 to spinster daughters, Kate and Caroline who at the time were living at 68 Frederick Street, Loughborough. His effects amounted to £1,985 1s. 5d.

During his lifetime, John Thomas had thrown himself into the life of the town. He had been chair of the trustees of the John Storer Charity; he was a director of the Loughborough Building Society for many years; he was a founding member and secretary for many years of the Loughborough Club; he served on the Town Council until the passing of the Education Act of 1902; he was on the Free Library Committee, and many other town charities.

After his death, a memorial tablet made of brass was created and unveiled at the Church Gate School, by Councillor Benjamin Braybrooke Barrow, who was chair of the Education Committee at the time. The tablet was inscribed:

 “John Thomas Judges, for 30 years headmaster of this school. Died December 28, 1909. This tablet is erected as a mark of affection by the past and present masters and scholars.”  - Melton Mowbray Mercury and Oakham and Uppingham News 12 May 191.

Barrow said of Judges:

“he was eminently accurate in all he did; an enemy to slovenliness in dress, manner of speech, whilst a marked characteristic was his politeness.” - Leicester Evening Mail, 7 May 1910

Mr Leon Morley, superintendent of the Parish Church Sunday School, who had been a pupil at the school, said of Judges:

“[pupils] knew of his wonderfully methodical habits, how he left nothing to chance”.

Kate, his daughter, was unable to attend the unveiling ceremony, but she instigated the John Thomas Judges Memorial Prize for the boy who had shown himself to have been the most public-spirited during each year for five years. Daughter Caroline, who was head teacher at the Warner School, was able to attend, and she presented a framed photograph of her father to the school.

Both daughters followed in the footsteps of their teacher father, although upon her marriage to John Ernest Theophilus Chapman, a 58-year-old widower, at Marylebone Church in 1913, and the birth of their daughter, Barbara on 8 February the following year, Kate gave up her teaching career. Although Kate’s husband died in 1921, it is unlikely that she re-entered the teaching profession. 

Caroline, however, did not marry, and in 1921 she was the headmistress of St Clements Church of England elementary school for girls in York. By 1939, Caroline had retired from her head teacher role, and was living at 14b High Street, Brighton, aged 79. By 1939, Kate was now widowed and was living at 21d Nevern Road, Kensington, London, with daughter Barbara, who had married Mostyn Cohen.

Kate Swoffer Chapman (nee Judges) died at Rayland Nursing Home, 54 Marine Parade, Brighton. Probate was granted on 4 March 1952 to Westminster Bank Ltd. and Barbara Joan Cohen (her daughter, and wife of Mostyn Cohen). Her effects were £10,820 4s.. 

Caroline Mary Swoffer Judges, of Karney House, Westbrooke, Worthing, died at 10 St Michael’s Road, Worthing, at the age of 93. She was buried at Durrington cemetery, West Sussex. Probate was granted on 24 September 1953 to Barbara Joan Cohen (her niece, and wife of Mostyn Cohen), and her effects were £1,170 12s. 8d.. Mostyn Cohen died in 1970, and Barbara in 2001.

This has been a very brief look at the life and times of John Thomas Judges. 

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

_______________________________________________

Thank you for reading this blog.

Copyright:

The copyright © of all content on this blog rests with me, however, you are welcome to quote passages from any of my posts, with appropriate credit. The correct citation for this looks as follows:

Dyer, Lynne (2025). So Who Was John Thomas Judges? Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2025/06/so-who-was-john-thomas-judges.html aboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2023/03/loughborough-and-isaac-newton.html] [Accessed 29 June 2025]

Take down policy:

I post no pictures that are not my own, unless I have express permission so to do. All text is my own, and not copied from any other information sources, printed or electronic, unless identified and credited as such. If you find I have posted something in contravention of these statements, or if there are photographs of you which you would prefer not to be here, please contact me at the address listed on the About Me page, and I will remove these.

External Links:

By including links to external sources I am not endorsing the websites, the authors, nor the information contained therein, and will not check back to update out-of-date links. Using these links to access external information is entirely the responsibility of the reader of the blog.

Blog archive and tags:

If you are viewing this blog in mobile format, you will not be able to easily access the blog archive, or the clickable links to various topics. These can be accessed if you scroll to the bottom of the page, and click 'View Web Version'. Alternatively, there is also a complete list of posts, which when clicked will take you to the page you are interested in.

Searching the blog:

You can search the blog using the dedicated search box that appears near the top of the blog when viewed in the web version. Alternatively, you can search using your usual search engine (e.g. Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo etc.) by following this example:

site: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/ “Radmoor House”

NOTE – the words you’re actually looking for must be in “” and the first of these must be preceded by a space

Thank you for reading this blog.

Lynne