St Helens Circle History-Foreword

history of st helens circle forewordLong serving St Helens Brother, Ron Parr, tells us what stimulated him to research and write the story of the formation of St Helens Circle..

What prompted me to write the Circle History?

Well, you may be surprised to learn that it was the menu printed for our Annual Ladies Night (or Turkey Dinner as it used to be called)! As you are aware, the back of the menu lists all the Presidents of our Circle from its inception to the present day but this was not always the case. Well, you may be surprised to learn that it was the menu printed for our Annual Ladies Night.

When I joined the Association in the late 70s the menu showed our Founder President (1914) then a blank against each year until 1966 then most, but not all presidents were listed. I queried this and was told that all our records had been lost or stolen and no one knew who they were. I decided to rectify this but didn’t realise that my research would take two/three years.

I scoured old directories, sought help via Catena and even visited Chesham Place in London. I also received help from an unexpected source, I was chatting to the sons of a long deceased member who had been Circle Secretary for a number of years. I told them of my research and they said that they had recently disposed of an old wardrobe from their parents’ bedroom and behind it had found a lot of Catenian memorabilia and offered it to me. It proved invaluable in my research!

Having completed the list I couldn’t let go!

I hope you enjoy reading my account as much as I enjoyed putting it together.

Ron

Click Here For The Circle History Part 1 Article