OUR CHAIRMAN, Roger Jephcott, opened the meeting promptly at noon.

He welcomed the thirty nine members present including today’s speaker, our own Dr Harvey Burnham.

He then announced that our ladies would be welcome to attend the June lunch when the speaker, John Sparks, would be talking about Antarctica.

Peter Riley said a short grace after which we all tucked in to yet another fine lunch with non-stop conversation flowing at each of the five tables.

After lunch the wine draw took place, no luck for me this time but my name was amongst those selected to provide a bottle next month – ah well such is life.

Roger then handed over to Harvey, whose talk was entitled ‘Doctor on St. Helena’. We all know Harvey but I suspect that not many of us knew the extent of his work.

From 1976 to 1980 He was the ‘Medical Officer’ on St. Helena and today he showed us a selection of photographs and told us many anecdotes relating to that period of his life. He went there with Isobel, his wife.

St. Helena is a small island about the size of Guernsey with a population of around 5000. It is of volcanic origin with near vertical cliffs around most of its coastline and it lies in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Its nearest neighbour is Ascension Island some 700 miles away. It had no airport and it took one week to reach it by boat. The centre of the island is lush and covered in flax, remnants of an industry that died out years ago.

Harvey and Isobel lived in the capital, Jamestown, which is built in a sheer sided, narrow valley on the coast.

Occasionally rocks would fall off the valley sides onto the houses below. Not my idea of fun but seems that Harvey fell in love with the place and its simple life.

There was virtually no crime (if you stole a bicycle everybody would know who’s it was), no solicitors (who needed lawyers) and a Judge who visited every two years just for fun.

There was a general speed limit of 30mph but no one could reach such dizzy heights of speed because the roads were too narrow with sharp bends everywhere.

Subsequently an airport was built but was not granted a licence to operate because it was deemed too windy! The initial test flight tried unsuccessfully to land three times.

It is many years now since Harvey was there but he obviously remembers it with a great deal of nostalgia. Thank you, Harvey, for a great talk with some impressive photographs. I didn’t notice anyone nodding off!

Robert Spencer gave the vote of thanks and Roger closed the meeting at 2.30pm.

The club has vacancies for a few more members so if any of you retired gents would like to find out more about us please contact Peter Frost on 01454 415448.