WHISPERING SMITH: The Games People Play

Venues such as the water treatment works, doubling as a velodrome, the swimming pool, Sportsdome – seating at least 27 – and Mewsbrook Park for aquatic events, with the miniature railway as the mainstay of the transport infrastructure, were highlighted. The bid launched with the prospect of a breathtaking games opening ceremony – a cake, three balloons and a biggish firework – costing a mega £150. Now it is just possible that this super spoof bid, still available for viewing on Youtube, irked someone on the Olympics committee, in fact irritated them to such an extent that the Olympic Torch will pass LA by altogether, running from Bognor Regis on to Arundel and beyond, leaving LA in total sporting darkness, forever denied that vital glowing symbol of world attention. Personally, I cannot wait for the games to come and then just as quickly go. Normal service will return on television, the synchronised swimmers will be completely synchronised and these cash-strapped isles will return to a relieving peace and quiet. Within a few months, heaps of useless Olympics memorabilia will be consigned to the folding tables of car boot sales, where they rightfully belong. However, perhaps we should not let this vicious slight go unnoticed. Perhaps we should organise our own Olympic flame and do a circuit of the town on the big day? Josie up at the bowling club is pretty nippy on a warm day, as is Graham from the snooker club. Piers, briefly holder of the pitch-and-putt record, has been known to stay awake for special occasions and Joe, a disc jockey – not strictly a sport, I know, but it sounds like one, and we could make an exception as the exercise will do his hip replacement the power of good – all would be willing to run for the honour of LA as, I suspect, would many others... THE LANCASTRIA REMEMBERED... I don’t know about you, but I am rather weary of the Hollywood-driven hype surrounding the tragic sinking of the RMS Titanic on April 15, 1912, with the loss of more than 1,500 souls in horrendous conditions. Movies, docu-dramas, television series, memorabilia sales, auctions, and the seemingly endless unpleasant whiff of commercialism cling to the memory of its passing. Yes, that tragedy does need to be and will always be remembered, but what of the RMS Lancastria? Bombed, she went down in the cold waters off the French seaport of St Nazaire on June 17, 1940, while taking part in the Dunkirk evacuation with the loss of well over 4,000 men, women and children – more than Titanic or Lusitania combined. No movies have been made that I know of, no James Cameron, Kenneth More or Leonardo DiCaprio, and the Lancastria Association itself is no longer operational. We, here in LA, a town with strong and honourable links to the sea, should also remember the Lancastria and those who perished with her on June 17, and remember them without help from Hollywood.