Mileposts In Memoriam

A sign of spring on Grand Union Milepost, March 2009

I've mentioned before how I dislike those rough and ready roadside shrines, full of filling-station flower-bunches taped to trees or railings or lock ladders.  Instant grief that eventually quickly rots away.

A much better way of honouring someone is in a canal milepost nameplate.  They are remembered long-term, with style and elegance. 

Milepost 7 on the Grand Union remembers Rodney Furze, and with those daffodil bulbs planted alongside, nature automatically remembers Rodney Furze too, each spring. 

But who is/was Rodney Furze?  I searched online but can't find anything about any Rodney Furze that relates obviously to the canals, so perhaps this milepost is his best memorial.  How lovely.

The Grand Union has many of these memorials.  Down near Harefield Marina at Milepost 79 there's one to Eily 'Kit' Gayford, one of the original Idle Women.   She's got no flowers, and that's probably not by request.  She deserves some.  Her milepost, No.79, looks lonely amongst the leaves.

In this Daily Telegraph story, Idle Woman Emma Smith refers to Eily Gayford as 'Kitty'.  It also refers to a plaque memorialising all the Idle Women, unveiled at Stoke Bruerne last year.  I'm an individualist, not a socialist, so I've always preferred the plaques that remember individuals, like Eily and Rodney.

Comments

[John Slee]

Any idea why I've been getting 4 or 5 of your Flickr Bugsworth Basin pictures along with these over the past week or so?