Today's Speaker was Dr.Sally Lawton. She had been trained as nurse and had a great interest in nurses in the First World War.  She told us about the conditions they worked in and how this had led her to write a novel The nurse who found herself in 1916.

Club Secretary Peter Schweiger, a woodsman, told us about his project to create a conservation orchard  in Jordan's Village near Beaconsfield.

Peter is a Trustee of the Chiltern Area Quaker Meetings (CAQM), who own a large part of Jordan's village, near Beaconsfield, Bucks. - originally established and built by the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), who have been meeting there since the 17th century. 

There is a field that had lain derelict for many years, with 200+ year-old oak tree at one end.  In late 2017 the blackthorn and bramble prevalent in the field was cleared, and a proposal made for the field to be made beautiful to encourage people to use it, with suggestions for the plot to be a multifunctional site.

 Buckinghamshire was famous for cherry orchards, and it was suggested that the oak tree could be used as a feature to encourage people into the field, by planting an avenue of cherry trees from the gateway up to it. 

Peter explained the various phases of the project, which was undertaken by volunteers - including our former Global Scholar Jane Eisenhardt - under his supervision, after clearing the land.