News in Brief
Find your family past
Have you thought about tracing your family roots or about how you can contribute to Hackney’s archives?
Hackney Routes, a new joint project between Every Generation, Hackney Archives and Hackney Museum, funded through the Hackney Heritage and Built Environment Partnership, can help you get started.
A series of free workshops and events across the borough will explore how individuals can research and record their own family roots and the story of their communities. They will also encourage discussion between communities about the different routes people have taken to settle in Hackney.
The first event – a discussion for adults on family history and genealogy – takes place from 6pm-7.30pm on 29 January at Hackney Museum in Reading Lane.
For more information on the project, to get involved, or to find dates events and activities call: 020 7241 2886; or visit the Archives page.
Dive in for charity
Double Paralympic gold medallist Eleanor Simmonds made a splash at the Clissold Leisure Centre when she helped launch Swimathon 2009.
The BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year, 13, was joined by Olympic gold medallist and Swimathon President, Duncan Goodhew, to encourage people to sign up and start training for the world’s biggest fundraising swim.
Hackney swimmers can take part in the nationwide event from 16-19 April at Clissold and Kings Hall leisure centres.To find out more about Swimathon, or to sign up, call: 0845 36 700 36, or visit: www.swimathon.org.
Voluntary Services together
An agreement affecting thousands of Hackney residents, the voluntary sector, and Hackney Council has been published.
More than 60 volunteers and chief officers from the Council attended the launch of the Hackney Compact on 13 January at a special event held at Freeform Arts, Richmond Road, E8.
The Hackney Compact is an agreement setting out how the Council and voluntary sector groups can work together to provide top quality services for the borough’s residents.
The police, City and Hackney Primary Care Trust, The Learning Trust, Hackney Homes, Hackney Voluntary Action, and Hackney Community College were among those who also signed up, together with representatives from the Community Empowerment Network and community groups.
The Hackney Compact can be downloaded from www.teamhackney.org/hackneycompact.
Changes in the pipeline
Come along and find out more about how a £3.2 million Thames Water mains replacement scheme in Lower Clapton will affect the area. A drop-in session is set to take place on 28 January, between 4.30pm and 6.30pm, in a mobile unit at the junction of Mildenhall Road and Lower Clapton Road, by the pond.
Thames Water will spend the next 16 months replacing nearly five miles of Victorian pipes with new, tough, and flexible plastic in the area around Lea Bridge Road, Lower Clapton Road, Millfields Road, Mayola Road, and the River Lea. Project manager, Tim Owens, said: "Wherever possible, new pipes will be placed inside the old metal ones, which means less trench-digging, minimising disruption.”
Works are scheduled to begin on 16 February, and local residents will also receive letters informing them about the scheme.
Free month for winning tenants
Three lucky tenants have won a rent-free January after winning a Hackney Homes competition. Gloria Sapians (below) from Stoke Newington; Joseph Kirwan from Dalston; and Olushola Davies from Homerton have enjoyed the past month free of charge, as part of a campaign to encourage residents to pay their rent on time.
During the festive period, nearly 12,000 residents did so, and more than 1,000 paid off rent arrears totalling over £138,000.
For more info, or to speak to someone about your rent, contact your local neighbourhood office or visit: www.hackneyhomes.org.uk.
By-election
A by-election is set to take place in Hackney, following the resignation of a ward councillor.
Residents in Stoke Newington Central Ward will go to the polls on January 29 to fill the vacancy left by Jamie Carswell, who resigned from the Council in December.
Only Stoke Newington Central residents on the electoral register are eligible to vote in this by-election, and they will receive a polling card by the middle of January.
Nominations closed on 2 January, and the candidates are as follows:
- Matthew George Hanley – Green Party
- Patricia Jane Napier – Conservative Party
- Karelia Scott – Liberal Democrats
- Nusret Sen – Direct Democracy (Communist) Party
- Louisa Maynard Thomson – Labour Party
Residents can vote in person at a polling station between 7am and 10pm on 29 January; by post; and by proxy.
For more information visit the Councillor Election in Stoke Newington Central page, contact electoral services on: 0208356 3233/3234, or email: info@hackney.gov.uk.
Pinter mourned
Acclaimed playwright, actor, director, poet, and former Hackney resident Harold Pinter has died, aged 78.
The author of The Caretaker and The Birthday Party was born into a Jewish family in the borough in 1930, and attended Hackney Downs Grammar School during the early 1940s.
He played Romeo and Macbeth at school and won a grant to study at RADA. Although his initial ambition was to be an actor, a turning point came in 1957, when an old friend from his Hackney days, Henry Woolf, asked him to write a play for Bristol University’s drama department. The result was his first work, The Room.
The initial run of Pinter’s second play, The Birthday Party, was dismissed by critics and pulled after a week. However, by 1960, The Caretaker had made it to the West End and Pinter’s success was assured.
He wrote dozens of plays during a career spanning six decades, screenplays including The French Lieutenant’s Woman, and in 2005 was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, among many other accolades.
He was outspoken in his political views, and a conscientious objector to national service during the Cold War, risking imprisonment. He was called before military tribunals but escaped with a fine.
Pinter split from his first wife Vivien Merchant in 1975, with whom he had a son, Daniel. In 1980, he married historian Antonia Fraser. In 2003, he was diagnosed with cancer, and died in west London on 24 December last year.
Sprinting towards 2012
Children and teenagers in Hackney can take their first step – or leap – towards 2012 by enrolling on an athletics training programme.
From this month, GLL – which runs Hackney’s leisure services – will provide six to 16-year-olds the opportunity to participate in athletics and sport with both a national and international aim.
The London Track Stars Junior Athletic Programme, at Mile End Athletics Centre, will see a team of UK Athletics qualified coaches offer training sessions in sportshall athletics, cross country, and track and field athletics.
The main aim of the programme is to attract families into the sport and promote long term involvement for young people in healthy physical activity. For info visit: www.gll.org/sportscourses/londonathletics.
A free play’s the thing
Two Hackney theatres are among 31 London venues taking part in a pilot scheme offering free tickets to young people.
The Hackney Empire, in Mare Street, and the Arcola Theatre, E8, have both been awarded a £30,000 share of an Arts Council England grant from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. Over two years, the £2.5million grant will fund a 258,000 ticket give away to Londoners under 26. Simon Thomsett, Chief Executive of the Empire, said: "We are delighted to have successfully secured funds from the Free Theatre Initiative and expect the scheme to be very popular indeed with our audiences.
“We already have a strong reputation for the genuine diversity of our audiences and for attracting people who do not necessarily consider themselves theatregoers. This initiative will allow us to target new groups and individuals for whom a visit is usually financially prohibitive.”
The Arcola’s Executive Director, Ben Todd, said: “This is really good for us. We already give away quite a few tickets with our 60-plus and Turkish group initiatives, funded by Bloomberg. Now we can give away even more, and strengthen our links with schools.”
For more info visit: www.artscouncil.org.uk/freetheatre.
Page updated: 15 Jun 2010
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