My Long-Overdue Report on an Extraordinary Lady

I knew Maddy from when we both volunteered for the New Milton Talking Newspaper.

In 2016, it was brought to my notice that she had boxes of cassette tape recordings which she wished to donate to a museum.

When I visited her, I found that there were hundreds of tapes of light music with introductions from a script , recorded by Maddy herself (using the microphone shown in the photo).

She had been a presenter on Lymington Hospital Radio before she set up a Monday Morning Tape Service, where she made cassette tapes available to local care homes. I was also shown various newspaper articles and photos of Maddy's contribution to the local community including fund-raising and her time as Secretary of the Ratepayers' Association.

I thought what she had achieved was extraordinary and her story should be told.

I asked local historian Nick Saunders if he would join me in another visit and as a result Nick wrote an article about Maddy in the June 2016 edition of the New Milton Mail/Barton Bugle.

I made a few more visits and compiled quite a detailed report with various appendices and after many years it occurred to me that I should at least put the main part of my report in my website:

Contents of My Report

1. Maddy's Story

Maddy's Story

2. List of Scripts broadcast for Lymington Hospital Radio

List of Broadcasts

3. Scripts for Tapes sent to care homes

List of Scripts used for the Monday Morning Tape Service

4. Analysis of Scripts & Tapes

Analysis of Tapes & Scripts

- Includes short article on Hordle House School in Milford on Sea

5. Local Care Homes who received the cassette tape recordings

List of Care Homes

6. Example of Tapes sent out - Solent Mead Care Home

Tapes sent out to Solent Mead Care Home

7. Details of the 6 tapes selected for retention

The 6 Tapes

8. The scripts for the 6 tapes (just one shown in this website)

The 6 Scripts

9. The newspaper article announcing the introduction of Maddy's Monday Morning Tape Service

Article in the Daily Echo March 1989

10. The article in the New Milton Mail/Barton Bugle June 2016

Article in the New Milton Mail/Barton Bugle

11. Visit to see Maddy October 2021

Visit to get photos for the website

12. Looking Back/Methodology

Methodology used

At the time of writing, Maddy was still volunteering on a Friday morning, when the New Milton Talking Newspaper is recorded and sent out on memory stick to sight-impaired listeners & published online.

Colin Bower
20 November 2021