When Weymouth's mayor took a ride in a bucket (From Dorset Echo)

When Weymouth's mayor took a ride in a bucket

8:50am Tuesday 5th January 2010 in

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TODAY we are dedicating a second Looking Back to Maureen Attwooll’s fascinating Second Bumper Book of Weymouth.

George III bathing in the sea, troops preparing to leave for the Normandy landings, Gladstone’s visit to the town in 1889 and families enjoying the fresh air and entertainment on the sea front are just some of the hundreds of nuggets of history peppering its pages.

One of the most entertaining – and potentially alarming – pictures has three men being winched over the harbour in what looks like a very large bucket.

The caption reads ‘Mayor Percy Boyle with the Town Clerk and a building surveyor is hoisted aloft and swung out over the harbour to view the 1930 Town Bridge construction works’.

Maureen became a local historian by accident.

She explained: “When Weymouth Library was in Westwey Road it had two sections, children’s and other books. Then they joined them together and made a reference library. I was a library assistant at the time and they put me in charge of the reference section.

“I soon found that a lot of people were coming in and asking about local history. I didn’t know half of what they were asking, so I decided to do a crash course in local history through lectures given by Weymouth historian Jack West.

“Then one day Dave Burnett from the Dovecote Press came in to the library to do some research and said there was a gap in the market for a Weymouth book because the last one to have been written was Weyland by Ronald Goode in the 1940s.

“He wondered whether I would interested in writing a general book about the town.”

So Maureen worked with Jack West on putting a book together and Weymouth – An Illustrated Guide was published in 1983.

“After that, it just took off,” added Maureen, who has so far put her name to 10 books about the town. This puts her up there with other local authors and historians including Richard Samways, Colin Pomeroy and the late Doug Hollings, former borough mayor and councillor, who wrote four books about Wyke Regis.

“The people who write about local history are all very helpful. We help each other when we can and swap ideas and information.”

Although she writes about Weymouth’s past, Maureen is very fond of the town as it is today. It is a bustling town and I think people are coming back to it.

“Even though we all complain a bit about the holidaymakers, I love seeing them all on the seafront by the bus stops.

“I think the town has a lovely busy atmosphere.

“I think the seafront is my favourite bit of the town, with the beach and the views out over the bay and along the cliffs.”

* The Second Bumper Book of Weymouth costs £19.99 and is available from WH Smiths in St Thomas Street, Weymouth.