About
The Grapevine is a community hub, communicating the latest news & notices from the Harkstead area
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The board can include anything from advertising local events and businesses, showcasing our many wonderful local talents and interests, sharing memories, public notices, health and well-being information, road closures, charities, local authority, or parish information, to simply posting appreciation.
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No offensive content will be uploaded, please be polite and courteous and be additionally mindful of any linked content you wish to include.
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History:
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The grapevine was started in 2007 by Margaret Harward to keep the village informed of any news via email. After her sad passing, her husband Roger took over until 2022.
Roger:
Grapevine started life some about 6 or 7 years ago. My wife, Margaret Harward, thought an e-mail based equivalent of the old village noticeboard might be useful. She had a great deal of experience with computers from her work. As she found getting around more difficult due to her declining health, Margaret hoped this would be a useful way to help fill her time.
It proved increasingly useful, to her delight, and acquired ‘subscribers’ rapidly. Soon Grapevine circulation exceeded the capacity of our old steam-powered computer’s e-mail program.
After searching around, she found a FREE template program called Mailchimp which allowed to e-mail Grapevine items reliably to all subscribers free. Up until now, Mailchimp has been the basis for the Grapevine but that may change! read on!
Unfortunately, Margaret died in November 2019 so I took over, enlisting the help of my 2 badly trained forefingers.
Soon after, The Covid 19 outbreak happened. Related items – surgery notes, offers of help, Good Neighbour Scheme, information, sunflower competitions, latest news ( but no invitations to parties in Downing Street), etc, etc – poured in. Circulation has built up to 93 subscribers and includes former residents who want to keep in touch with Harkstead’s doings.
Having battered my forefingers for 2 years, I have decided to give them a rest and “passed the baton” on to Haydn Morris. He actually knows how to work this sort of stuff – knows all about those long words like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. The future starts here!
My story:
I lived in Holbrook in the 70s and 80s, my father was the headmaster of the primary school and loved growing up on the peninsula. In fact, I feel incredibly fortunate to have done so, I had a wonderful childhood here. I moved to London as a teenager but knew someday I would return. That was the dream, perhaps not much of a dream for some, but it was my dream! Now I am blessed with the opportunity to bring my youngest up here and be actively involved in the community, so took the chance to take over the Grapevine and hopefully develop it to appeal to a wider audience.
Haydn