Welcome to the second Westerman Seminar

The 2012 Westerman Seminar at Portsmouth Grammar School on Saturday 11th February is only a few weeks away and I thought I would spend some time to tell you a little more about the exciting programme.

Guest speakers for this year are Dr Rachel Johnson from the University of Worcester with her talk How Westerman changed the Henty Hero and Dr Philip MacDougal with If war should come -the views of selected children's writers of the 1930s on the forthcoming European War and I will deliver Missing, Believed Lost – an update on research since the last seminar.

There are a few additional items including an interview/conversation with Eric Axford whose mother Amelia was Percy’s home help. Eric will bring along Percy Westerman’s writing chair from The Barge and tell the story of how he got it, plus many more anecdotes.

The University of Worcester have also loaned some items for display from Westerman Collection that were not available last year and we will have some previously unrecorded items from the Wareham Weekend Reminiscence Project that have been kindly loaned from Wareham residents/participants.

The seminar will be the platform to launch the latest Portsmouth Grammar School Monograph publication titled Tales of Pluck and Daring – the life and work of Percy F. Westerman. Each delegate will receive a complimentary copy of this limited edition full-colour publication.

The guest book dealer for this year will be David Schutte, a specialist in children’s books and Westerman Yarns will also have a small collection of books on sale.

Tickets are £15.00 and include all refreshments and a buffett lunch. For a booking form or if you have any questions about the event please email me at westermanyarns@gmail.com

The Westerman Seminar 2012

The
Westerman Seminar
2012

Celebrating the life and works of
Percy F. Westerman (1876 – 1959)

Saturday 11 February, 2012
10am – 4pm
Portsmouth Grammar School

This seminar will build on the success of the first Westerman seminar held in 2011.

An opportunity to learn more about this great writer and his contribution to the ‘Ripping Yarns’ genre.

Speakers include: Dr Phillip MacDougal (author and historian), Dr Rachel Johnson (Research Librarian - The University of Worcester), Nigel Gossop (Westerman Yarns)

The Westerman Seminar is supported by Portsmouth Grammar School – Percy F Westerman attended the school between 1890 and 1893.

For ticket information and booking, please email Nigel Gossop at

westermanyarns@gmail.com

A Memorable Weekend in Wareham

Westerman Yarns have had a busy few weeks in supporting Wareham Library, The Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre, The Redclyffe Yacht Club and Wareham Town Council in the delivery of the first celebration of Percy F. Westerman in the town where he spent the last 40 years of his life.

Westerman Yarns - inspiring another event
Following the success of the First Westerman Seminar my wife and I visited Wareham on the anniversary of the death of Percy F. Westerman back in February this year. Whilst we were there we approached Wareham Library and the Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre and suggested that it would be good to include Percy F. Westerman in their promotional material alongside T E Lawrence and Thomas Hardy. I was delighted when they called me a few weeks later to say that they wanted to arrange a special weekend in honour of Percy F. Westerman.

The event titled ‘The Call of the Sea’ was held over Saturday 29th and Sunday 30th October.

The Westerman Yarns Exhibition
Westerman Yarns supported the event by producing a series of information panels for an exhibition currently on display in the Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre. The panels offer a brief outline of his life, following his journey from Portsmouth to Wareham.

The Westerman Yarns Reminiscence Project
On Saturday we launched a reminiscence project Thankfully, there are still people living in the area that had met or knew Percy and his wife Florence. The good news is that the project has got off to a flying start and we already have a number of interesting and useful stories, adding colour and detail to the Westerman research.
We had already met with a few Wareham residents with great memories including Michael Spilman whose father was a shipwright and who had carried out work on The Barge and Eric Axford whose mother worked for the Westerman’s and whose claim to fame was, that it was she and Florence wheeled Percy from The Barge into Wareham on a borrowed builders handcart after he fell and broke his leg. Their help has been invaluable in gathering and recording real memories that build on our knowledge of Percy F. Westerman.

If you would like to get involved in the project or know someone that may be able to help with information or memories or memorabilia, please email me at westermanyarns@gmail.com or pick-up a form from Wareham Library or the Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre.

The Launch
Everyone attending the launch was welcomed into Wareham Library by music from Hugh Elms and his wind-up gramophone. The opening ceremony was well attended and after the speeches and the official opening by the Mayor of Wareham and the Commodore of the Redclyffe Yacht Club, we were treated to a polished and entertaining performance by Wareham’s own shanty group The Wareham Whalers (right).

Raft Race
The Wareham Library ran a model raft building competition open to children and adults culminating with a race on the River Frome. Competition was fierce, but the pirates, made up from Redclyffe membership (see picture at the top of the page) ensured fair play and the safe return of all the rafts.

An Illustrated talk ‘The Forgotten Author’
During the afternoon I gave an illustrated to talk on Percy F. Westerman. The talk was launched with a musical introduction by Dr Rachel Johnson from the University of Worcester who played The Westerman Hornpipe on her recorder. The University of Worcester kindly loaned some of the Percy F. Westerman Collection for the weekend and Dr Johnson was actively promoting the research collection. After the talk, the audience were invited to stay for refreshments provide by the Wareham WI. One memorable moment was when Michael Spilman from the reminiscence project told us that he had just recognised his father working on the roof of The Barge in one of the slides shown in the talk.

Literary Guided Walk and Redclyffe Yacht Club
Sunday began with a literary guided walk led by David Kemp. A tough collection of Wareham’s finest braved the rain for the walk finishing at The Redclyffe Yacht Club who opened their doors to provided welcome refreshments and an opportunity to see their own display of photographs showing the development of the club founded by Percy F Westerman, their first Commodore.

Captain Blundell’s Treasure – Play Reading
If I was to have a favourite event from the weekend, it has to be the play reading by a band of Wareham volunteers who bravely agreed to take on this project. My wife and I travelled up to Worcester in early September and copied the script sending it off to Wareham Library, giving them just a few weeks to rehearse. The play was produced and directed by David Kemp and narrated by John Barclay (writer and poet). Considering that the group only had a few weeks to study the script, their performance was excellent and included a special guest, Dr Rachel Johnson (Research Librarian, University of Worcester) in the role of Marjorie.

Acknowledgements
I really enjoyed the weekend and would like to thank the following people who worked so hard to make it all happen with apologies for anyone that I have inadvertently omitted, Jude Leyman and the staff of Wareham Library, Liz Roberts and David Kemp, and the staff of the Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre, Rod Curtis, Town Clerk, Pam Boddy and Allen Wilkinson, Commodore, and the members of the Redclyffe Yacht Club and Eric Axford, Michael Spilman and Nigel Barnes, the friends of Westerman Yarns whose generosity, time, reminiscences and loan of material to progress research has been so valuable. Very special thanks to the University of Worcester and Dr Rachel Johnson for generously supporting the event with the loan of items from the Percy F. Westerman Collection. Finally, my wife Wendy, who is my rock in watching that I don’t run aground!
Viewing the Westerman Yarns display and Percy Westerman Collection from The University of Worcester.

A Special Celebration in Wareham

The Wareham Westerman weekend programme is now complete. If you would like me to send you the poster or the leaflet as a PDF file please drop me an email to westermanyarns@gmail.com .

Alternatively, contact:
Purbeck Information and Heritage Centre
South Street,
Wareham.
BH20 4LU
Tel: 01929 552740
They will be pleased to post copies out.

WWW

What does www. stand for? In this case it is Wareham Westerman Weekend.

Westerman Yarns is working with a very enthusuastic team of Wareham based organisations who are planning the towns first celebration of the life and works of their famous past resident, Percy F. Westerman. Time for a Westerman party!

Below is the first press release outling the early plans.

Wareham is busy making plans to celebrate the life and works of an, until now, overlooked famous, past resident. Children’s adventure book writer, and arguably, the originator of the ‘Ripping Yarns’ genre, Percy F Westerman, spent many years living the idyllic life on his houseboat ‘The Barge,’ moored by the towpath at Redclyffe, close to Wareham. It was from this converted Thames Barge that he penned more than 120 of his 174 published books.

The Wareham Westerman Weekend on Saturday 29th and Sunday 30th October, 2011, is being organised through a collaboration between Wareham Library, Purbeck Information & Heritage Centre, Wareham Town Council, and a host of other organisations and individuals, all keen to raise awareness of this remarkable author whose lasting gift to Wareham was the founding of the Redclyffe Yacht Club in 1933, with both Percy and his author son John having been past Commodores of the club.

A detailed programme will be available soon, but will include children’s pirate parade, make and race a model raft, a treasure hunt, a colouring competition and a live music event. An exhibition exploring Percy F. Westerman’s links with Wareham and a display of books from the Wareham Library reference collection, donated by the Redclyffe Yacht Club will be a key feature of the weekend along with an illustrated talk and a reminiscence project. Jude Leyman, Library Manager said “We are very excited about the weekend and an opportunity to raise awareness of this prominent children’s writer whose contribution to the literary heritage of Wareham should be celebrated by the town that he loved so much. The special collection of his books is an important feature of our reference collection here at Wareham Library”. Liz Roberts, Centre Manager said “We are delighted to be involved in the project and will be jointly organising a series of events of the weekend with our colleagues in Wareham Library”.

His stories covered tales of the sea, scouting, flying machines, deeds of derring-do, mysteries, two world wars, tales from history and much, much, more. Titles included The Scouts of Seal Island, The Bulldog Breed, Fighting for Freedom and The Flying Submarine. These gripping stories fired the imagination of generations of young readers encouraging a love of books and reading to remain with them for the rest of their lives.

Percy’s first book A Lad of Grit was published in 1908. During the 1930’s Percy was voted the ‘Most Popular Boys Author’ in a poll sponsored by a national newspaper and organised through public libraries. By his death on February 22 1959 his books had been published in many languages and had sold in excess of 1.5 million books worldwide.

Who is Pennington Cross?

At the recent Westerman Seminar I explained how my research led me to discover that Percy F Westerman has written under the pseudonym Pennington Cross for stories published in The Scout. The name Pennington Cross is the name of the place near Lymington in Hampshire that became his home after leaving Portsmouth and where he lived between 1911 and 1918.

The information below has been released earlier than I wanted, because, although I did ask at the Westerman Seminar to withhold the information until I had verified the details as much as possible, the word has got out.

My wife and I discovered the link last year, but still needed more proof. Thanks largely to Gregg Worwood who has trawled through many of the books, it does appear that the research has been proved correct. I have much more information on the Pennington Cross home and what PFW did whilst he was there, but I am saving that for a publication that will be available later this year.

There were 49 volumes of The Scout Annual published between 1908 and 1954. For a copy of the latest Pennington Cross titles list, please email your request to me at westermanyarns@gmail.com

The Westerman Yarns Seminar 2012

Following the success of the first Westerman Seminar in February, I am pleased to announce that work has started on the next for 2012.

The date of the next seminar to be held at Portsmouth Grammar School is Saturday 11th February, 2012. Ideas and themes for the programme are being explored, but as 2012 is the 100th anniversary of one of Percy’s most popular books ‘The Flying Submarine’, I am considering an airship/submarine theme to the programme.

Tickets for the next seminar will not go on sale until the autumn. If you would like to receive advance programme details and booking notification, please email me at westermanyarns@gmail.com