HarMONICA and mouthorgan workshops

Starcross History took part in the Thankyou for the Music event today in St Paul's Church. The display of photographs and information about Starcross included a file of recently Unearthed material.

Musical workshops Monica presented were an invitation to play the glass harmonica

and to make&play the Comb&paper Mouthorgan

Quite a few of the grown-ups could play one. Maybe, with a bit of practice, we could have a Starcross Comb Band??

The event continues tomorrow with a Pet Service at 2:30pm followed by Cream Teas

Parrot, Hats, Masks and Scarecrows at the Village Activity Day this Saturday

When St Paul's Church held their All Creatures Great and Small Festival over the May Bank Holiday weekend, Starcross History's contribution was meant to be a steampunk workshop - so what's steampunk  AND creaturely?  STEAMPUNK PARROTS

So Starcross History helped children make Parrots out of card, lolly sticks, buttons and bits of material. Many thanks to Pauline Allen for staying all day to help.

There's some leftover parrotmaking stuff, so we'll do the parrot workshop again at the Starcross Village Activities Fair this Saturday in the pavilion on Starcross Sportsfield.
Parking is off General's Lane EX6 8PY

 We also have a quantity of hats&masks leftover from our September steampunk hat workshop. We hope that these will inspire people to create a scarecrow for the Starcross Scarecrow Festival on June 18th

so we will give them away to anyone who wants to put it on their Scarecrow Day scarecrow.
You don't have to live in Starcross to enter a scarecrow - you can bring it for display on Starcross Sportsfield  

 

Peacocks' Tails Trail Workshop

The children of Starcross Primary School made lots of progress today in Melissa Muldoon's Peacock Club workshop

The workshops started 2 weeks ago. The children looked at pictures of peacocks, real peacock's feathers and a model of a peacock. Because the Peacocks' Tails will be displayed outside, stuff used to make them had to be weatherproof.

 

Materials gathered included: CDs, silver foil, bottle tops, plastic sheets, buttons and beads. 

Here's some of the peacocks' tails eyes

 The next stage was to devise a framework for the peacocks' tails. There are lots of ways this could be done. Here's a tail Pauline made by attaching some wooden slats to an old fireguard, covering the slats with green netting, and trimming the netting into a fan shape with feathered edges.

When the children attached the eyes, and some green tinsel was added the result was magnificent. This promises to be a spectacular tail.

Melissa started another tail with a broken garden rake for the base

White feathers, made from plastic milkbottles, were added. More decoration will create another splendid tail.

A another idea from Melissa: attach green plastic feathers; made from a sheet of scrap plastic flooring; to some aluminium rods (which might have once been a TV aerial) 

There's another tail-in-the-making behind this one. It's a broken, blue umbrella.

When the eyes were added to the feathery fan, everyone thought the result was really good

Messy Church in St Paul's Church are going to make 2 tails. One will be for Captain George Peacock's grave in the churchyard, which will be the starting point for the Peacock's Tails Trail around the village. The other Messy Church tail will be the finishing point; in St Paul's Church.

At least 10 tails will be made for the Peacocks' Tails Trail, which will be a trail around some of the historical places in Starcross on St George's Day - Saturday, April 23rd. Tail Trail cards will be on sale in the church on the day, for £1 each. The cards will list the whereabouts of each tail with a rhyming clue, in true Dartmoor letterbox style. Each tail will be near to one of the important places in the village, such as Regent's House where Captain George Peacock lived. Captain Peacock invented a screw propeller, and anti-fouling paint. He designed his iconic, Victorian yacht 'The Swan of the Exe' - which is pictured on  the Starcross History club badge.

 By each tail on the list will be a Dartmoor letterbox-style rubber stamp with a stamp-pad. The first 50 cards back, complete with all the stamps, will win a real peacock's feather.

Captain George Peacock lived in Regent's House

Look for the letterbox under the mouse 

and please has anyone an old computer mouse they don't need? Cheers 

Starcross residents are invited to make and display a peacock's tail outside their house, with a Dartmoor letterbox-style stamp and pad hidden nearby. For your creation to be listed on the Peacocks' Tails Trail cards, and to have a chance to win the trophy for the BEST PEACOCK'S TAIL; please let us know about it before April 1st. 

The Peacocks' Tails will have another outing on Scarecrow Day; Saturday, 18th June. They also have a 3rd engagement - with Trail Recycled Art in the Landscape in Teignmouth for the summer season.

If you have anything you would give us to make a peacock's tail, please get in touch.

Thanks

Devon Rural Archive

The resident archaeologist at the Devon Rural Archive, Abi Gray, has invited Starcross History to visit the archive, for a workshop, or to explore the collection.
Opening Times: Monday, Tuesday and Thursday 11:00am to 3:00pm
Devon Rural Archive is in Shilstone, near Modbury, Plymouth PL21 0TW
Please get in touch if you're interested.
Thanks

The Devon Rural Archive is open every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday between 11am and 3pm. Entry is free and there is no need to book.

Find out more on   The website for the Devon Rural Archive

Steampunk Hat Workshop in St Paul's Church

Thankyou everyone for your support. We've now accumulated enough steampunkstuff for future workshops, but more donations can always be used

The materials gathered for this workshop included:

• Hats, watches and trimmings from The Attic, Baker's Yard, Alphinbrook Road, Alphington, Exeter EX2 8RG
• More hats from charity shops
• Spectacles
• Net, silver trimmings, gold card, ribbons and black fascinator bases from Exeter Scrapstore 
• Nuts, bolts, chains, tools 
• Material and leather pieces
• Feathers
• Buttons
• Jewellery
• a clock 

Look at this fabulous creation by a 6-year-old. He picked out the top hat, and arranged all the steampunk bits and pieces he fancied. Then we used a glue gun to fix them to the hat. Magic!

Steampunk creation

Here's what's on the marvellous topper:

spectacles
butterfly
bird
strawberry
2 zips
2 watches
2 green buttons
piece of a silver sock
a white metal clip

Here's the steampunkhat workshop in St Paul's

Steampunk hat workshop

St Paul's Church was open for the Devon Historic Churches Day
The newly completed Starcross Wall Hanging was on display. Village organisations and residents have each made a square. This is living history.

A leaflet about the history of Starcross Church was given out. St Paul's Church was originally the Holy Trinity Church in Chapel Hill in Exmouth. This church became too small for the increasing congregation, so it was demolished, and the stone was shipped to Starcross to build the Victorian St Paul's.
Photographs and comprehensive information about the history of Starcross was on a side table.

Steampunkjunk Poster

Please can you paste the link for this post around the internet? and print&display the poster somewhere?
Thanks

Steampunk hat workshop

Since St Paul's Church in Starcross is Victorian, we will bring the first of our VICTORIAN STEAMPUNK HAT WORKSHOPS to the Devon Historic Churches Day on Saturday 12th September. 9am - 4pm. We invite you to come dressed in full steampunk regalia. There will be no charge for this fun workshop which is both  for adults and children, but the steampunkjunk to create your hats will be on a Bring  and Buy basis. You can bring your own hat to steampunkup, and share ideas, or perhaps you'll spot some 'I must have that' steampunkjunk you'll have to buy.

The children will also be able to make Victorian mobcaps with a circle of material and ribbon, or tophats with cardboard and cellotape. They might like to add a few cogs&feathers.

Some of the Starcross steampunk hats here pictured have taken weeks to produce. They are works of art. Can you spot the one with the REAL GLASS EYE?

If you want to bring a hat to embellish with steampunk stuff, we will have lots of it on sale: clocks, dials, cogs, feathers, flowers, lace, net, zips, spectacles. We'll also sell some hats for you to work on.
For a small donation, you will be able to make a simple hat: a circle of fabric and ribbon will make a mobcap; some card stapled together will make a topper. But you can still add some wackiness if you buy some of our ridiculous decoration. You might just want to buy items to work on at home.
What is steampunk? It's a celebration of the Victorian era: their way of life, inventions, literature, explorations and fashion.

For the workshop, we need more hats; men's women's and children's. Flat caps, bowlers, top hats, wedding hats, straw boaters, velours, safari hats, berets, military caps,  - any hat can be adapted to steampunk.
We need more things to add to the hats: anything already mentioned PLUS: pieces of engineering such as bicycle parts, rubber tubing, telescopes, magnifying glasses, maps, screws, nuts&bolts, buttons, cotton reels, locks, keys, handles, sewing items and safetypins.
We also need: material, cellotape, glue, string, thread, wool, ribbon, tape, and perhaps you have scissors and staplers we could borrow.
And we might need some help on the day.

The materials we don't use will go into future workshops.

Devon Historic Churches Day Saturday 12th September

As part of Devon Historic Churches Trust's Devon Historic Churches Day, St Paul's will be open from 9am - 4pm on Sat 12th Sept.

The wonderful folk at St Paul's will be serving bacon baps from 9am - 12 noon. The wall hanging will be on display, and literature on the history of the church.

The Starcross Wall Hanging. Each 1foot square illustrates an aspect of our village life

Embroidery of the square depicting the new memorial garden for the Royal Western Counties Hospital

Starcross History has been invited to bring a display. The last time we went to St Paul's, we had a workshop to make feathers for The Swan of the Exe. This time, we'll have a workshop to make Victorian hats: mobcaps, from a circle of material and some ribbon; and top hats using card. Maybe we'll add a touch of modern with old sunglasses, camera bits, clockbits, feathers and GEARS... -  steampunk tophats? 

 

 

We'll ask for a donation towards the cost of materials. We'll get some of them from Exeter Scrapstore, which we joined as a group when we needed some white netting for the wings of our swan.

Please can anyone help on the day? We also need material and card and steampunk hat accessories; more scissors, staplers bodkins and cellotape too. Thanks.

Steampunk hat stuff we would like

• old hats
  feathers
  old sunglasses
  old glasses
  nuts
  bolts
  gears
  cogs
• smashed clocks and watches (not digital)
• anything else you can think of which would have been around in the Victorian era
•  
•  
• Here's some pictures of steampunk hats.
  
  
  
  
   
  
   

What is steampunk? Wiki has the answer - it's about Victorian fantasy. Jules Verne. fantastic inventions. Victorian technology.

Steampunk hats can be quite expensive steampunk hat on ebay

Another Crocodile Story

Starcross History's sculpture for Trail Recycled Art in the Landscape in Teignmouth is almost ready to install in its place in a flowerbed by Teignmouth Pier.

The black netting for the swan's wings was just to show Starcross History members on Wednesday  how the sculpture will go together

The Starcross History artist, Vicky Jocher,  and  Starcross History Chair, Monica Lang,  looked for some white netting for the swan's wings; on Dawlish and Teignmouth beaches. They only found a tiny bit.

Monica located some large, white net curtains on Exeter Freecycle and Vicky drove to Topsham to collect them. Joanne Bickel from Butterfly the Dawlish Community Art and Craft Centre had already donated a large white net curtain, and Vicky had used some of that for the maquette.  Monica and Vicky felt that net curtaining might not be strong enough to withstand being in all weather all summer, on Teignmouth seafront.

Monica telephoned Exeter Scrapstore. Peter immediately told her that they had some white netting with squares 2 inches across. 

Today, Vicky and Monica travelled to  Exeter Scrapstore
and enrolled Starcross History.
Exeter Scrapstore collects left-over materials from manufacturers and unwanted scrap. 'Since 1985 the Scrapstore has been involved in offering creative opportunities for playful and artistic use of scrap materials...'
Starcross History will make more use of this facility by organising craft workshops in Starcross Pavilion.


Monica and Vicky bagged the white netting, and took it back to Starcross to put it on the sculpture

Monica thought this white netting was ideal

But Vicky said NO! It's far too new-looking

 The net is scrap material, but it hasn't been used before. It is new. It looks new.

so

It's spending tonight in a Starcross swamp

with a Starcross crocodile

FREE archives workshop. May 11th.

Political Research and Archives Workshop

Monday, 11 May 2015, 10:00-13:00

Devon Heritage Centre, Bittern Rd, Exeter, EX2 7NL.

As part of the From the Grassroots project, the Devon Heritage Centre will be running a free workshop in archival research. This event will be of interest to people considering a career in the archives sector, as well as those who just enjoy researching local/political history.




In this workshop you will learn more about the cataloguing processes that archives use, including CALM for Archives, which is a Windows-based collection management system for archives.

With a focus upon political archives, professional archivists will demonstrate how to make the most effective use of archives, enabling you to maximise the efficiency of future visits to both record offices and online resources.

During the workshop you will also have the opportunity to take a tour of the Devon Heritage Centre. This is a rare opportunity to have a behind-the-scenes view of how a professional archive is managed in the areas that are not accessible to the general public.

The search room

Spaces are very limited.

Please contact Kayleigh Milden by Wednesday, 6 May to book a place:

Kmilden@histparl.ac.uk        

Tel: (01392) 384838

Thankyou Devon History Society for this information