Stuart Christie remembered
Stuart Christie, a memorable former Hastings resident, died last weekend at the age of 74. Nick Terdre remembers a remarkable man and friend.
Stuart Christie, a memorable former Hastings resident, died last weekend at the age of 74. Nick Terdre remembers a remarkable man and friend.
The arrival of Covid-19 has worsened the chronic problems of homelessness and rough sleeping which already afflicted Hastings. HOT’s Nick Terdre talked to Cllr Andy Batsford, Hastings Borough Council’s lead for housing and homelessness, about how the situation has been tackled since the virus turned our lives upside down, and the worrying prospects now looming up.
The government has finally accepted that if test and trace is to work properly, local expertise and resources need to be incorporated alongside the centralised system, though there is as yet no indication that local authorities will be given extra funding to do local contact tracing. Separately the Department of Health and Social Care is said to be planning a merger of NHS Test and Trace with the pandemic response work of Public Health England. Research and graphics by Russell Hall, text by Nick Terdre.
During the long wait for a bus, local artist and writer, Maureen Connett, has been pondering what can be done to cheer up the town centre, in particular the bus stops at Queens Road. She would have liked to share her art portraying local places in Hastings on the empty spaces at the bus shelters, but it looks like the Pandemic may have put paid to a ‘laudable initiative’. We can take another look at Maureen’s art here.
In the autumn of 1852, Edward Lear, while painting a fig tree in the overgrown garden of the Hastings MP Frederick North, made a lifelong friendship with the MP’s daughters, which affects lives to this day. Artist and writer Maureen Connett tells us more about the lesser known artistic and musical talents of the writer, Edward Lear, best known for his limericks and nonsense poetry.
HOT photographer Russell Jacobs happened by the pier last night in time to catch the aftermath of a bad traffic accident in which a man was seriously injured. According to the police, the occupants of the damaged car are believed to have been in an argument with the occupants of another car before the incident.
Putting on a film festival in the middle of a pandemic is no easy feat, but that is exactly what local film-maker Francis Saunders has achieved. Nadene Ghouri shares a sneak preview of the films on show this weekend (Saturday 16 and Sunday 17 August).
Last week saw the annual Hiroshima Day commemoration in Hastings. First held by Hastings Against War (HAW) in 2005, Hiroshima Day has been staged here annually since 2007. John Enefer reports.