Heritage Centre's Anniversary

On Thursday 4th April the Committee of the Heritage Centre celebrated the 10th anniversary of the opening of the Centre with a lunch at the Plough.

Where have those years gone?

We began with very little to display and now we have a large collection of pictures, artifacts, documents, old photographs and details of local family histories. In fact anything to do with Wilmington can be found at the Centre. The Centre is open twice a month - on the first Thursday and the second Saturday from 10.00am - 12.00pm.

A warm welcome awaits everyone who visits.

In so far as the opening of the Heritage Centre is concerned, this was done on Tuesday, 18th March, 2014, by Sir James Whitehead Bt, together with the Mayor of Dartford, Councillor Patsy Thurlow. I was Chairman of the Heritage Centre Committee at the time, and of the Wilmington Society under whose umbrella the Heritage Centre Committee was formed. I introduced Sir James followed by a few words by Jean Radford, Committee member and local historian. Sir James then gave an interesting account, inter alia, about Sir James Whitehead, former Lord Mayor of London, who lived in Wilmington for many years.

Derek Hunnisett was Treasurer of the Committee and we managed to raise the finance in time for the completion of the project. The main Corporate Donors were Clubb Ltd; the Centre is named the Clubb Room, Dartford Borough Council, Wilmington Parish Council, the Memorial Hall Committee, the KCC, the Heritage Lottery, the Wilmington Society, the Garfield Weston Foundation and an NKP Project. Many individuals also contributed.

I believe that at the time the building was opened, the Committee included Derek Hunnisett, Jean Radford, John Longstaff, Chris Baker, Ashley Hambridge, Cllr Ann Allen, Stan Stringer, Wendy Gregg and myself as Chairman.