2006 Jag Day
Mild day.
Collected for British Heart Foundation £167
Minibus from Ready Rent a Van of Normanby Rd Scunthorpe £70 was booked by Oliver Construction Ltd of Immingham and then donated by them, so £70 given by jag team for mini bus was added to donation, making a total of £250.
Started at Steve Hindley’s. West Common Crescent, Scunthorpe.
Gainsborough
Xtra 10.20. Breakfast & Sword dance rehearsal
Gainsborough Market Place 11.00. Ploughjag
Lords 12.30. Songs and tunes
Eight Jolly Brewers 12.30. Plough jag
The Gamekeeper, Scotter. 14.00. Ploughjag & songs
Pink Pig , Holme Lane Bottesford 16.00. Ploughjag
The Three Horseshoes, Scotton 18.00. Tea, then Ploughjag at 19.00.
Malty Shovel , Ashby, Malt Shovel 20.00 Ploughjag, songs and Tunes
The Lion’s Head, Winterton 21.15 Ploughjag, songs and tunes
Characters
Rag Fool Eamon Greene s
Recruiting Sergeant Jim Hancock
The Lady Gordon Griffin
The Horse Dave Hoy
Joe Straw Steve Hindley m
Flash Hatman Keith Brown s
Beelzebub Dave Barlow s
The Doctor Geoff Miller s
Dame Jane Geoff Turner
Besom Betty Geoff Turner
Hatmen Sergeant Geoff Convery s
Hatman Pete Boulby s
Hatman Dot Griffin
Musician Jerry Oakes Gainsborough only
Musician Bob Cleveland Three Horse Shoes onwards
The day started with both Geoff Convery and Keith Brown having lost their voices. Jim Hancock, having had previous knowledge of this, stood in as the Recruiting Sergeant. Jim wore the ‘old’ uniform; Geoff Convery wore his ‘new’ uniform. To avoid a repeat of last years attempt to improvise swords, Gordon Griffin had very kindly manufactured nine to go with the three ‘borrowed’ from The Tatterfoals Morris team to make up twelve wooden swords, in a box. Eamon brought Tatterfoals’ steel swords, so we could have equipped three sword teams. The collecting box was not found, but Fran Ross helped us out by bringing one along to Gainsborough.
Despite being a bit behind schedule when leaving Scunthorpe, we caught up by having just a bacon butty each for breakfast at Xtra, and arrived spot on time in Gainsborough Market Place. In honour of Gordon’s new swords, one set was used for this performance.
Jerry Oakes joined us for the Gainsborough venues. There was a good crowd including some of Gainsborough Folk Club, a contingent from Gloucester, and George?, who was busy with his video camera. Mike Dewsbury took photos, and Fran Ross kindly took some photos with Steve Hindley’s camera. Somehow the Jag was missed when we got to Lords but was made up for by the songs and tunes and the spontaneous and spirited Irish dancing by the barmaid, Hannah.
The Eight Jolly Brewers was cramped but the Jag was well received, and a couple, Kev and Joy, invited the Jag team to perform at their wedding reception on May 6th 2006.
At The Gamekeeper the Guest family were there in force and had brought some friends. Rob and Gillian Guest presented the team with a cutting from a Longsword magazine which included a photograph from 2005, of the sword dance being performed using curtain rods.
The place was moderately full and one little girl, whose birthday it was, was treated to a close up view of the Jag, some of which she spent on Beelzebub’s shoulder.
We next visited a new venue the Pink Pig. Several people who were just leaving were convinced to go back in to see the Jag performance, and hopefully they were not disappointed. One young lady, who was there with two children, was overjoyed, as she had done some work on British folklore whilst at college and had never dreamed that she would see a plough play.
Denise Butler served up some good fare at the Three Horse Shoes, after which we went out and came in again to do the Jag. As elsewhere, there were a good few children, whose reactions were varied from fear to wonderment. Allison Gennery carried out her roll of taxi driver, now traditional, for Bob Cleveland and they followed us for the rest of the day.
The Malt Shovel in Ashby was full, and the Jag received a warm welcome – 11 pints and an orange juice – on the bar. This was an appropriate pub to do the songs ‘A Pint of Old Peculiar’ and ‘Ten pints of Tetley’s’.
The day finished with the Jag and a grand concert at the Lion’s Head. The place was standing room only and stayed so until the Jag left. Unfortunately, Chris and Terry Hood were not there.
