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November 1948

November 24, 1948

Few places were more thickly blanketed by Monday night's fog than Newark. Had it been any worse there would have been a complete blackout.

It made trains late, upset bus service time-tables, and in some cases put buses off the road altogether.

One incident of the fog was that two Ossington children could not get home and they were put up at the police quarters in the market place.

So bad were the conditions that although the lights were full on in the market place none of them could be seen a few yards away.

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Two Newark Scouts, Trevor Capes and Ronald Swan, have been awarded the King's Scout Badge. The presentation was made by the Chief Scout, Lord Rowallan, at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich.

The two lads, both members of the 5th Newark troop, were the guests of Scout headquarters in London, and were accommodated on board Discovery, Scott's exploration ship, which is moored near the Thames Embankment.

The award is the highest that can be gained by any Scout, and training for the badge is most exacting.

Work for the award included an ambulance course, 10 weeks' fire fighting training, weekend pioneering camps, the organisation and running of troop camps and a 20 mile hike in Wales.

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The Newark Detachment of the British Red Cross Society was presented with the Portland Cup by county director Major W. Foster at its headquarters in Baldertongate on Wednesday.

They won the cup in Nottingham in February in the county competition for home nursing and first aid. Thus the detachment will have their name inscribed on the cup for the third time.

November 17, 1948

Flags were flown from the Town Hall and other buildings in Newark on Monday to celebrate the Royal birth.

A telegram of congratulations was sent to Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh by the Mayor (Ald J. H. Knight, JP) on behalf of the town, and on Monday evening the bells of the Parish Church rang in salute to the infant Prince.

Members of the Parish Church band of ringers, under their Master, Mr E. C. Thrale, assembled in the belfry at 7pm, and as is the custom on royal occasions all the bells were fired in salute.

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For the first time in several years, the East Midland Division of the Association of Assistant Librarians met at Newark Town Hall.

The members were welcomed by Mr R. P. Blatherwick, JP, Chairman of the Gilstrap Library Committee, who expressed pride at the high place occupied by the library among similar institutions throughout the country.

Mr Blatherwick said he would never forget the thrill of pride he had last year when listening to a well known librarian from one of the big provincial counties address a conference in which he used Newark as an example.

One of the things he did was to compare the services rendered by large libraries with those given by the smaller ones, and the summation was that neither quantitatively nor qualitatively was there much to choose between Manchester and Newark.

November 10, 1948

Early showers and a cold uninviting North wind made conditions cheerless in Newark on Sunday morning, but the townspeople turned out in large numbers for the service of Remembrance.

Both at the memorial and in the church the worshippers began to congregate some time before the service was due to begin. They included a considerable number of Service and ex-Service men. Contingents of the 8th Battn The Sherwood Foresters, and the Army Cadet Force, under Major John Nicholson, were among the first to take up positions at the War Memorial.

They were followed by the Sea Cadet Corps and the ATC, and the long procession of British Legion members headed by their band. As soon as the last note of 11am from the great bell of the church had died away all those within and without the church observed the Two Minutes' Silence, the end of which was signalled by the members of the Legion band.

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Few children can remember a pre-war November 5 so as far as the younger generation were concerned Friday's celebrations were conducted with traditional gusto.

However, fireworks were in short supply, and as a result there were crowds of people at the mammoth community bonfires at Barnby Road, Elm Avenue and on the Hawtonville estate.

November 3, 1948

After an interval of 10 years the Newark High School Speech Day was held at the Palace Theatre last Wednesday.

Once more there was an opportunity for the whole of the school, parents and friends to be present.

The occasion was particularly pleasurable for some old girls because the guest of honour was Miss M. Skues the first headmistress of the school.

There is now a register of 445 girls, and the importance of providing each with the opportunity to develop her talents was stressed by the present headmistress, Miss B. M. Dibb.

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Driving round Newark is a car which can run on paraffin candles instead of petrol. The invention is the work of Mr Frank A. Crawley, a consulting engineer of Little Carlton.

After 11 years of experiment, Mr Crawley has evolved an apparatus for attachment to internal combustion engines which does away with petrol as engine fuel.

Patents for the invention have been applied for and arrangements for the production of the apparatus are in the hands of a London agent, pending further permission from Government departments.

The inventor, who describes his attachment as a miniature oil refinery under the bonnet, says the unit, which consists of a special carburettor and other mechanisms, can function economically on any car engine, irrespective of horse power.

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