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Update on our March activities

Published on: Published in: Club news

Here is an update on our March activities:

International Women’s Day Exhibition: Women of Richmondshire

In March 2024 SI Richmond and Dales celebrated International Women’s Day by putting on an exhibition of over 100 women who contribute to the community in Richmond. The response from the many people who came to see it was so encouraging that we expanded the exhibition for 2025 to include women of Richmondshire.

This display covered women from local past history as well as women of today, from varied walks of life.  They are women who contribute to local life in all sorts of roles, exalted or humble, but each in some way keeps the wheels of their community turning or enhances local life.

The exhibition was displayed in a free exhibition in Richmond Town Hall on Friday March 7th, and we were very proud that it was opened by Richmond’s Lady Town Crier. Entrance was free, with light refreshments served.  Thanks go to members of the club for donating these, especially our bakers. As usual, we held a raffle and some visitors gave donations, so we were able to raise £160 for our funds.  Almost 100 people attended this successful event.

The Exhibition in progress    The Town Crier Opens the exhibition    The project Team

We now have a display from the exhibition on view in the Richmondshire Museum, which opened on April 1st for it’s 2025 season.  Our thanks go to the Museum for giving us this opportunity to extend our exhibition’s life.

The Museum display  Some of our Women of Richmondshire A folder containing a page for every "Woman of Richmonshrie" featured

March Meeting

Choir of the Earth

Our March meeting featured one of our members as speaker.  Jenny Cathcart talked to members about the online choir of which she is a member.  This began as a COVID project, to bring an opportunity to choral singers to sing together remotely during lockdowns.  The Self-Isolation Choir was a tremendous success, producing a performance of the Messiah featuring 12,000 singers from all round the world. This was “broadcast” on YouTube.  It was such a success, that the choir is still going strong.  Now transformed into The Choir of the Earth (COTE), it has just celebrated its 5th Birthday.  YouTube video “classes” and guide recordings are used to teach members the music. Those who wish to can make recordings of themselves to send in.  These are mixed by audio engineers with professional accompaniment and soloists to produce virtual concerts. All the choir’s concerts be seen on YouTube.  Concerts range from choral works large and small, from Mozart Masses to songs by ABBA and The Beatles.  COTE is a source of great enjoyment for members, all in the comfort of their own homes.

Charity Fundraising

Speakers and events are now all confirmed for our 2025-26 programme.  The biggest fundraiser will be a Knock-out Rounders Match on Sunday 8th June at Richmond Equestrian Centre in Tunstall.  The aim is to encourage 16 teams of 10 to enter, at £50 per team.  On the day there will be various other activities including face painting, bouncy castle Poo Bingo.  A barbecue will be run, plus donations bar, tea and coffee and a cake stall.  It is hope there could be 200+ people attending. The money raised will go to our main charity of the year, Hambleton & Richmondshire Palliative Care Team. We will be assisting the daughter of one of our members in organising this event. She is leading on the project in memory of her father, who received wonderful care from the Palliative Care Team until he passed away late last year.

We will also be running 3 fund-raising coffee mornings at Richmond Town Hall, as usual – with raffle, tombola, cake and book stalls.  We have also agreed to hold a mini-raffle at each of our meetings for a small prize which will be donated by members in turn.

“Material” Help

We have also confirmed plans with North Yorkshire County Council’s Youth Voice Team to make large tote bags to be given to children in care to carry their possessions, in place of the current “bin-bags”.  Packs of upholstery and curtain fabrics have been purchased from a haberdashery sale, and packs (plus instructions!) were given out at the meeting to members with sewing machines to start on the first batch.

We were also pleased to welcome to the meeting the newly appointed local representative of SmartWorks Leeds, who is based in Catterick. We will be collecting further items of suitable clothing, shoes and accessories for their clients, to enable them to dress smartly for job interviews.