Author Robert Ashton is on a mission to erect a blue plaque in Blaxhall, Suffolk to commemorate the fact that writer George Ewart Evans lived and worked in the village. Here, Robert explains why
A year ago I returned to live at Leiston where both my wife and I grew up. It was for my 14th birthday that my parents gave a copy of Ask the Fellows who Cut the Hay by local writer George Ewart Evans. I was working on farms at weekends, not far from Blaxhall where Evans had lived. That book captivated me and led to a lifelong fascination with rural history.
In 2019 I stopped taking on paid work and went to the UEA as a full time student, graduating a year later with a creative writing MA. My dissertation was the first section of a book that explores the work of oral historian George Ewart Evans. That book, Where are the Fellows who Cut the Hay, will be published in April.
Tell us about the Blaxhall blue plaque campaign?
My book research took to me to Abercynon, where Evans was born. There’s a blue plaque on the front of what was his father William’s shop, and the family home. There’s another on the house he moved to in Needham Market, when the family left Blaxhall, but nothing in Blaxhall.
There was a wooden commemorative board inside Blaxhall’s Youth hostel, which until 1976 had been the village school. Florence Evans had been headmistress there from 1948 and the family lived in the adjoining school house. But the Youth hostel has been sold, we think to be developed into housing, and few if any in the village know of the board’s existence.
So with the village churchwarden and Parish Council, I’m running a crowdfunding campaign to place a blue plaque on the village hall, so that everyone knows that Ask the Fellows who Cut the Hay was written by George Ewart Evans while he was living in Blaxhall.
What else will happen on the day the plaque is unveiled?
If the campaign succeeds, the plaque will be unveiled on Sunday 7th April, by some of the older folk who knew the Evans family. Then we’ll be screening both A Writer’s Suffolk the BBC film Evans wrote and narrated in 1980, and Here’s a Health to the Barley Mow which was filmed in the village pub in 1955 and captures Blaxhall’s rich folk singing tradition.
To complete the afternoon, I will be in conversation with Blaxhall’s newly installed vicar Rob Leverett about my book, Where are the Fellows who Cut the Hay which by then will be newly published.
How can people get involved?
They can visit our crowdfunding page here, and pledge to support the campaign. All supporters will be listed in a commemorative booklet that will be produced by the Parish Council. If they can come along, they can also buy tickets to see the two films, and if they wish, pre-order a copy of my book to pick up on the day. I’ll be donating half the money I take on book sales that day to the village appeal to repair and restore the church tower. Blaxhall has been so good to me, helping with my book research, I’m keen to repay their kindness. Any money we have left over after we’ve bought the plaque, paid the film projectionist, and funded the tea and cakes, will also go to the tower appeal.
Visit Blaxhall blue plaque to George Ewart Evans (crowdfunder.co.uk). The project will receive all pledges made by March 11, 2024 at 8:07am. If the target is reached, the plaque will be unveiled on Sunday April 7, 2024, at Blaxhall Village Hall. Robert’s latest book Where are the Fellows who Cut the Hay? will be published on April 4. 2024. Pre-order from Amazon. Also, visit Blaxhall Community Tower.
Featured image of Robert Ashton, by Joe Lenton
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