Lions host Anstice concert

Ironbridge Lions held their fist event at the Anstice Memorial Hall on Saturday 27th January. The club has hosted a Christmas concert for some years but this has been held at the Methodist Church in Wellington. This year the reopening of the historic Anstice building gave the club the opportunity to hold the concert more locally and to donate the proceeds to the fund established to complete the refurbishment of the building and the modernisation of its facilities.

The event was organised by club Secretary June Softley and despite her concern about numbers, the concert was extremely well attended. Around 160 people were in the hall to see and hear performances from the Laura Deighton Dance Academy, the Side by Side Ukulele band and the amazing young musicians from the Abraham Darby Academy. A great atmosphere in a wonderful building – and best of all it raised over £1000 towards the restoration of the Anstice. All the performers gave their time and their talent for free.

The Anstice was built for the community of Madeley in 1869 and the building is a memorial to Mr John Anstice a prominent and well respected mine owner and philanthropist. For many years it housed the Anstice working mens club but when that ceased trading in 2014 the building was bought by Madeley Town Council on behalf of the local Community. The Town Council is working in partnership with the Anstice Community Team (a group of local volunteers) and together they are working to restore the building to its former glory at the heart of Madeley.

And when all the money was counted, the final total was in excess of £1300 – which Ironbridge Lions rounded up to £1500 – A great result for a great cause and we are grateful to everyone who made that possible, At the end of February, Lion President Charlie Miller returned to the Anstice, this time to present a cheque to the Anstice Community Trustees. The picture below shows Lions President, Charlie with the Treasurer of ACT Karen Price (on the left) and ACT Trustee Rita Mannering.

We plan to hold more entertainment events in the future and in the meantime the club will be back on 26th March for the Prostate testing evening.