Kimberley Connection

Harking back to family knitting memories... so much is owed to my maternal grand parents.

They would have known good times and bad times but I think it was pleasure and a sense of quiet satisfaction as much as necessity which led to their lifelong creativity with wool. Hour upon hour, spanning many decades, spent
usefully yet contentedly and enjoying each others company.

Constance Taylor 1878-1975

Edmund  and Constance Kimberley

This is Grandma, Constance Taylor, a young school teacher at the end of the nineteenth century. Is'nt she splendid? No wonder he fell for her. 


Here they are just after Pam Pam, Edmund Kimberley, returned from the second South African (Boer) War at the turn of the twentieth century.



How close he got to the South African township of Kimberley I don't know. But interestingly this year I came across a knitting charity, KAS - knit a square, based in South Africa  which is persuading knitters all over the world to knit squares for blankets to warm the millions of Aids orphans there. The runaway success of this simple family run project epitomises the power of little things done with love, knitting people together.

Mentioning this charity to a cousin she recalled how Pam Pam had told her about going to war in South Africa. The commanders not aware of the bitter cold nights that are the norm in South Africa stripped all the men of their great coats as soon as they disembarked, thinking they would be warm. Many men needlessly suffered badly and sadly today many, many children suffer too.


Woolly Facade