OUR October meeting was well attended.

Chairman Catherine Hughes welcomed everybody - including new members.

The speaker - Peter Frazer - needed no introduction, he is one of our members. His talk was very interesting. The topic of his talk was Sir Henry Morton Stanley - father of William who donated Morton Stanley Park to Redditch.

Sir Henry - born in Denbigh in 1841, married in Reath (two welsh connection!) - was born John Rowland's. He died in 1904. During his childhood his mother deposited him in a workhouse. The master there was a hard man but a good teacher so when Henry left he had had a good basic education. He became a sailor but was abandoned with no pay at the end of his first voyage. Then he joined the southern army of the American civil war, was taken prisoner and later joined northern armies.

By 1869 he was a newspaper correspondent - sent to Central Africa to find the Scottish missionary and explorer David Livingstone. It was he who spoke the well known words "Dr Livingstone I presume".

Stanley continued exploration - charting Lake Victoria tracing the course of the Congo, various other adventures and helping to establish the Congo Free State - now Zaire.

The vote of thanks was given by Mary Jenkins.

Our next meeting will be at St Luke's Hall, Headless Cross at 7.30 pm on 3rd November - topic "Welsh Railways". No need to be welsh to join - just to have an interest in Wales.