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SD Hand Printed Letters & Pigeon Post

12 MAY 2022

Hand Printed Letters

Among the dozens of letters in the Trevor Westgate collection is this one from Albert, who attended Roman Hill School over 100 years ago.

The children studied parts of his letter and, just like artist Kate Munro, were very impressed by the style of writing, not least because, if you wrote a text message like that, people would think you were shouting.

Albert wrote about his job with the Eastern Coach Works in Lowestoft, and this led to a chat about coach trips; we thought it would be interesting to ask the residents about any trips they’d taken.

And whilst of course Kate didn’t want to encourage people to shout at one another, she did like the idea of printing in capitals.

“It looks like he’s printed it, except for the letter ‘i’; he should have used a capital letter for that.”

Alberts letter to Trevor Westgate

Printing-a-message-to-one-of-the-residents

Tiny-printing-blocks-and-ink-pads

Pigeon post

The children printed messages and sent them, pigeon post, to the residents.

A-flock-of-pigeons More-carrier-pigeons-with-messages-for-the-residents

And the very next week, a flock of pigeons returned, each with a brief note about a memorable coach trip.

News-of-musical-tastes-and-hobbies Some-pigeons-returning-from-the-residents

“Hi all, my name is Martin. I spent my life driving coaches every day. I went all over the British Isles for work. I sat at the back on the left hand side when I was taking my break. I could always smell people’s food, especially egg sandwiches.”

As well as lines about coach trips and tastes in music, we received this pigeon from Martin, in which he explained about his job as a coach driver.

Martins-pigeon