FIFTEEN club members attended a memorial service at St Peter’s Church, Bishop’s Waltham, for a former member and president Pam Simcock who died, aged 77, on September 11. Many Soroptimists. their families and friends, will remember the summer barbecues held in her beautiful garden. Pam designed the garden, which was for her a continuing source of delight. She and her husband Ken liked other people to be able to share their enjoyment. Pam was a person of enormous energy, enthusiasm and talent. She was a floral artist who won gold medals at the Chelsea Flower Show in both floral art and garden design and later acted as a judge. She originally trained as a midwife and when she was club president she chose the Fistula Hospital in Addis Ababa as her charity. The club supported it for many years with blankets,shawls and other knitted items

Headway is a charity which provides support to people who have suffered a brain injury and their carers. It is one of the local charities which SI Gosport, Fareham and district elected to support this year, so four members of the club went to see what exactly it does. We spent a most enjoyable morning chatting with the group over coffee, shown in the pictures below. Some had been injured in road accidents, others had had strokes or other medical problems. What was very clear to us was that they found it really helpful to talk to each other about ways of coping with their disabilities and to share experiences. What we perhaps hadn’t expected was the amount of fun they had and their enjoyment of shared activities. It was a really inspiring visit: one lady had abseiled down Portsmouth’s Spinnaker Tower the previous week

Thirty one people enjoyed afternoon tea at the Wheel House, Hill Head, thanks to the club’s annual Contact the Elderly tea party. Members entertained 21 members of Gosport and Fareham Contact the Elderly plus their drivers along with ten members from one of the Southampton groups. Club volunteers cooked and served an afternoon tea – providing a variety of sandwiches, cakes, sausage rolls and scones with jam and cream. And numerous cups of tea. There was a lot of happy chat between the members and the drivers who sat amongst them. Volunteer Stella Astbury said: “I had a call from one of our elderly gentleman members to tell me it was the best tea he had been to over the years he has been with us. “He said it was a warm friendly atmosphere and he could not believe it was free.” The weather stayed

Members of the club spent a day collecting donations at the Newgate Lane, Fareham, branch of Asda. The event was organised by Margaret Smith, second left in the picture, who set up a rota of volunteers. Thanks to the generosity of shoppers £308 was raised for the Portsmouth and Isle of Wight branch of Headway, the charity that supports people with brain injuries.

The club assembled in the rural village development of Knowle for a walk around the Hampshire County Lunatic Asylum originally built in 1852. Our guide was Dr Susan Burt, fifth from left (in a white top), whose thesis was a review of some of the patients there in the 19th century.  She explained the history of the development, how the asylum location was selected for its tranquil wooded outlook and there were two separate wings, one for women and one for men, each housing 200 patients.  More buildings were added as the need arose. The main building, although unpretentious, must have seemed like a palace to the local labourers and farm workers committed there under the Poor Law.  They were issued clothes, and fed regularly, which may have been more than they got at home.  When released, judged cured, they often had gained weight.  Many

The title reflects the conversation when club member Tracy Gardiner invited former Regional President Joyce Boorman to visit the club – when Tracy suggested she was a “tame” Federation Director, Joyce bristled and claimed she had “attitude”! Joyce gave a brief introduction to herself and her position as a Director without Portfolio, and then presented the slides on the SIGBI Strategic Plan – Vision 2021.  Some members had already heard this at the regional meeting, where Finance Director Judith Lewis had spoken about it, but it was worth repeating to the whole club.  The presentation laid out the vision for our organisation’s 100th birthday in 2021. One of the aims is to increase our membership, and the club is looking forward to receiving three members from Chichester club and inducting a new member at the next business meeting. There were questions about Associate Membership, and

At the club business meeting in July, we inducted new member Claire Cage (right). She is shown receiving her badge, as confirmation of her membership, from President for the Month Wendie Douglas (left). Claire has already been active in the club’s activities, including helping at the Southampton half marathon event with the region in June. She joins the “Chichester three” as newcomers to the club, and we wish them all a long and happy membership here. The business meeting also saw the collection of another £5 bag of 5p pieces – a regional initiative for the house we support at Mamelodi, a village community for AIDS orphans in our Friendship Link region of South Africa.  The club sends round a piggy bank at each meeting, and over the last year or so has collected at least £40 to take to regional meetings – we are

  The title reflects one chapter in a book on Women in War, edited by our speaker Paul Strong, shown flanked by Stella Astbury, acting president, and Tracy Gardiner, the colleague who introduced him. Paul is a military historian working locally, who gave a rousing review of some of the key female characters of the second world war.  They ranged from the famous, like Elizabeth Windsor driving lorries in the ATS and Junior Commander Mary Churchill on anti-aircraft batteries in Hyde Park, to those that should be, like Corporal Joan Pearson who won the George Cross for bravery in rescuing aircrew from a burning plane. But mostly Paul told us about the range of jobs that women took up during the war, primarily to release the men to fight, but also that demonstrated what they themselves were capable of – whether spotting a V2 factory